03 The Red Ring
by Tzarina8472
Summary: Having lived in an undersea research lab all his life, Alwen dreams of being Sonic. Sonic and his friends rest on Angel Island at the "merciful" fists of Knuckles. When fortunes suddenly flip for both parties, Amy learns what it's like to be Sonic as he learns what it's like to be orange. In this fun adventure of friends and situations, Eggman wants the deadly Red Ring.
1. Prologue: Fish Out Of Land

Fish Out Of Land

"_I didn't mean it!" Sonic threw his hands up at the sight of the orange dog and his video camera. "It was a joke! Why can't you guys take a joke?"_

_Tails crossed his arms. "How did you even _know_ about that?"_

_The self-proclaimed Sonic Chaser held up a tiny device. "We picked the lock and hid a listening device in your lab."_

"_Let me see that!" Sonic ran forward and grabbed the circuit board, crunching it between his fingers._

"_Hey!" His long mouth dropped open and his arm was outstretched. He shook his head. "I thought you were supposed to help everybody! You know, hero."_

_Sonic rubbed his fingers together to get rid of the circuit dust. "Not people who stick their mechanical ears where they don't belong! Tails, get his camera."_

_Tails took the camera, and pointed it at the news guy and Sonic. "It's still recording!"_

"_Good." Sonic patted the camera man on the back. "Now I'm sure you did all this to track me down and get an interview, right?"_

_He nodded._

"_Well, here's your interview. How many listening devices are in me and my friends' houses?"_

_He pointed to the ground. "You crushed the only one."_

"_Are you ever going to pull a stunt like this again?" Sonic looked down a little to match the dog's stooped eye level._

"_No, I learned my lesson."_

"_And what lesson was that?" Tails shifted his hold on the camera._

_He looked up, smiling. "Not to get caught next time."_

_Sonic snorted, but caught himself. "Dude, I like you, but it's just not cool to go around doing stuff like that. You got lucky _this_ time. There _are_ reasons I tend to keep a healthy distance from curious people like you."_

"_For the record," Tails pointed the camera at his friend. "What kind of reasons, Sonic?"_

_Sonic looked directly into the camera. "I like you guys, I really do. But it's not uncommon for Egghead to send out a bunch of random bots every now and then. That are programed to shoot me on sight." He patted the orange dog on the back. "Ok? Eggman is dangerous, but I'm worse. Stay out of trouble, stay out of the cross fire, stay safe. You got that?"_

_He nodded again._

"_Good."_

_Tails waved his hand beside his chin as he pushed the red button._

_Sonic shook his head. "Say, do me a favor and show this to someone, ok? That way no one else gets any_ more _bright ideas."_

_His doggy smile suddenly grew wider than his nose. "Anything for you, Sonic!"_

"_Now that is what I call cool." Sonic smiled and gave Tails a thumbs up._

_Tails turned off the camera. "It's off!"_

"_Uh, the correct term is 'cut.'" The news reporter took back his camera._

"_Take care of yourself." Sonic ruffled Tails's hair. "Common lil' bro, let's get there before all the fish are fried."_

"_Wait!" The dog held out an arm after them. "Is there any way I can help you?"_

_Sonic thought for a moment. "Anything interesting happen since those shape shifters split?"_

"_Well, there was mystery why none of Dr. Eggman's battle ships had the usual symbols…"_

_Tails smiled and shook his head._

_"Recently there has been a slight meteor shower."_

"_Whatever was left of the Egg-Nightmare came crashing down?" Tails asked. "Oh, and Eggman told us that the decals were absent because he didn't have time to paint, so he left them off."_

_Bewildered, the news reporter simply shook his head. "Nothing interesting you wouldn't know about already."_

_Sonic gave him a thumbs up. "Good answer! I like the guy who can sum it all up in one breath." He grabbed Tails's hand. "Come on, we don't want to be late." The two ran off through the trees, Tails faintly answering Sonic._

_The news reporter relaxed and smiled up at the high branches of a nearby tree. "So there you have it folks, well said by the hero himself. This is field camera man Luke Laber, reporting live from Green Valley."_

Alwen pointed the remote and turned off the TV. "Leave big jobs for the big kids, huh?" He thew the remote across the five by seven foot room. "What about the rest of us normal people, huh, Sonic!? I'm a hedgehog too! It's not my fault I can't do any of the cool and exciting stuff _you_ get to do!" He plopped down in one of two bean bags in the tiny room. "I can't spin, I never learned how to grind, and what's the point of learning how to run fast when you live with your parents in an undersea marine research facility?!"

The room was very small, almost too small to throw a temper tantrum in. The flat screen TV was bolted to one wall, under it was a pile of video game equipment. Alwen looked to his left, the window wall where he could see the fish swim by. _The algae is growing too fast again._ On the wall above him were the family photos, all three people who lived in this two bit under sea bubble. Alwen stood up and opened the access ladder on his right. He climbed down stairs into the kitchen.

"Mom, why couldn't I have been a world hero like Sonic the Hedgehog?"

His mother put down the knife from chopping carrots and gave him a squeeze. "Sonic's mother can't give him this every day."

"Mom," Alwen tried to wiggle free, but then hugged back.

She sat on a stool. "Now, what's this about being a hero?"

He huffed, staring away. There was no relaxing window in the kitchen. "I'm bored, Mom. There's nothing to do except play video games, and watch the news."

"You like to watch the sunrise," She ran her hands through his short spiky hair. "And you like to swim."

"Yeah, but I can't go to the surface without sitting in a pressure chamber for a couple hours. I want to explore the land. You know, South Island, ARK, Angel Island, Emerald Coast…"

His mother laughed. "Station Square? The Great River?"

Alwen giggled back. "You know me. I just feel like nothing important happens down here."

"Your father are doing important work here, honey. Imagine what it would be like if we could communicate with aquatic Mobians! A whole other world to explore that we've been living with all this time but could never understand."

"I can imagine." Alwen sighed. "I guess I'm just bored of it all. I'm home schooled, so I have no friends. I can't even go across the street to play with the neighbors because we don't have any. That is, unless you count the fish, which I don't. Yet. And I'll never go to the store to you grab something from the store because it's always delivered by Captain Flip."

Mom's face blanked for several seconds, like how she froze when she was number crunching in the lab. Finally she stood up and continued chopping carrots. "Go find your father please and tell him that supper is almost ready."

"Consider it done." Alwen smashed the button to open the ladder tube and climbed down again. _This place is too small to hide in._ He suspected Mother's sudden dismissal meant that she'd talk to Dad about something, maybe even taking him to the surface sometime. Maybe even a vacation. He dared not hope as much, though. It could just as well be a ride up and back with Captain Flip.

* * *

As it turned out, supper had been 'almost ready' because Dad would finish helping. Alwen heard their voices above while he set the table. Then after they started to eat, Dad dropped the bubble.

"How would you like to visit the land, Alwen?"

"Really?" What a surprise. "I'd love to!"

"Your mother and I discussed it and decided to ask you if you would want to ride the next sub to the surface." His father helped himself to the salad.

"Just me? What about you?" Alwen took the mashed potatoes from his mother and began spooning it on.

Mom folded her hands. "Dad told me that we could be on the verge of a major breakthrough in interpreting those music signals we receive from aquatic Mobians. You'll be going alone."

"What do you say, Bud?" Dad asked.

Alwen stared at the far wall. _To see the sun and moon for real, trees and grass, and to feel the air move on its own all by itself… but without Mom and Dad…_

"Don't you think you have enough potatoes, dear?"

"Huh?" Alwen looked at his plate, where the mountain of mashed muck left hardly any room for salad. "Oops! I guess I got too much!"

"Thank you for sharing, Bud." His father reached over and grabbed Alwen's plate, spooning about half of what was there onto his own. "So, do you want to go?"

"Yes!" Alwen nodded. "And I know just what I'm going to do when I get there!"

Mom smiled. "Let's see, what will you need? You'll want a mobile phone, large backpack, suit case, sleeping bag…"

"Wait, what? Where am I going?" Alwen got his plate back and added salad.

"To Aunt Vickie's. You don't remember her." Dad leaned back in his chair. "She owns a farm."

"A farm?"

Mom smiled at her husband. His chair came down. "Yes, and there will be so many new and interesting things to do there that you've never done before. You'll get to ride a hay wagon, jump in a pile of leaves, play with kids your own age, and much more. I remember when I lived on that farm."

"That's where I met you, at the school's annual corn roast." Dad poured a puddle of gravy in his mashed potatoes.

"We're sure you'll have a wonderful time!" Mom picked up her fork and attacked the salad.

"Yeah, I'm sure too." Alwen stared down at his plate, wondering about the people he'd seen on TV today. "When is the next shuttle?"

"Tomorrow at noon." His father passed him the gravy. "Another thing. Aunt Vickie's farmhouse also serves as a boarding for the school in town. We'd like to send you there for the first quarter, just to see if you like it. If not, you can come back."

Alwen carefully placed his hands around the gravy bowel.

When he didn't respond, Mom patted Alwen's back. "Sweetie? Are you thinking about Sonic and his friends?"

"Yeah." He used his spoon to turn his mashed potatoes into a volcano, then he carefully poured some gravy over it.

"You'll get your chance, Bud." Dad smiled. "Just take it one step at a time."


	2. Chapter 1 Hide And Seek

Hide and Seek

It was evening on Angel Island. Dark purple sky speckled with twinkling stars and outlined with lush tropic trees and bushes.

Knuckles stood atop the Master Emerald. He held up a fist full of lime green glow sticks, surveying the combatants and knowing full well what they were most likely in for. "Here is the game. Several of these hidden around the surface of the island. Whoever is back here with all three of their color in hand first wins! No serious caving, nothing buried, but they are _very_ hard to find. Rules. If two of you get here at the same time, the first to break them all, wave them above their head, and shout 'I'm a Hokey Pokey!' wins. If there is_ still_ a tie, then it's rock paper scissors three out of five." He pointed to Sonic. "Yours are the hardest, I think."

Sonic saluted him, keeping his other hand on the stone bricks. "Thanks for the heads up, Knucks!"

Amy raised her free hand. "What happens if we find a glow stick that's not our color?"

Knuckles shrugged. "I don't know. Do what you want with them. But if you break it, be aware that it makes it easier for that person to find."

"I don't think we should even touch other's glow sticks." Cream smiled.

"Chao!" Cheese nodded.

"And what will _you_ be doing?" Tails asked.

Knuckles crossed his arms. "I'll be making dinner for you guys."

"If you're cooking, I'm heading for the hills." Sonic laughed.

"Just for you, Sonic, Cream's mom came too so she'll be helping me a little."

"Are you sure you won't be helping her?" Amy smiled.

"There's a small chance of that." Knuckles looked around. "Any more questions?"

Sonic bounced on his toes. "Can we go yet?"

Knuckles pointed to the glow sticks in his hand. "After you have these, you must visibly carry them with you the whole time. No hammerspace!" He crouched and looked around at everyone. "Ready?"

"More than!" Sonic mirrored his crouch.

"Go!" Knuckles jumped high, glow sticks in the air.

Sonic sprang like lightning at the glow sticks, realizing too late that they were still in Knuckle's fist. He sailed over the entire shrine as Knuckles gently put the glow sticks down around his feet.

"Make sure you get the one with your name on it!" Knuckles stood up.

Tails picked up a stick and looked at it, then flew off.

Amy and Cream traded sticks before Cream and Cheese disappeared together. Amy looked at Sonic, then quickly replaced the glow stick still on the Master Emerald with the one in her hand. She ran away giggling.

Sonic picked himself up and ran past the Master Emerald, the glow stick suddenly in his hand reading: **AMY**

"She did that on purpose!" Sonic glared, pointing at Knuckles. "And _you_ didn't do anything!"

Knuckles laughed. "There are very few rules in this game. Time's wasting, Sonic! Go get your glow stick!"

Sonic ran in the direction Amy had gone. "AMY! COME BACK!"

_Where had she gone?_ Sonic stopped and listened. _Pop!_ He dove into the bush and grabbed hold of the fugitive girl with the wrong glow stick.

Amy could hardly control her laughter. "Did my Sonic finally find a reason to chase me?"

"I wasn't chasing _you_, Amy Rose." Sonic picked up the stick with his name on it. "I had to catch this." He held it between his fingers and wiggled it. The bright glow made a sort of X in the air.

"What?" Amy cracked up again. "Cream's stick?"

"WHAT?!" Sonic rolled it until he found the black paint letters.

**SONIC**

Amy roared with laughter, almost slapping his face. "You… You should've seen the look on your face! AH HA HA!"

"Yeah, yeah, yeah..." Sonic carefully pulled himself out of the bushes. "I'm out of here!" He left her laughing on the ground.

Sonic skirted the edge of Angel Island, running in the area known as Drop Dead Zone. Although not a real zone, the name still rang true. If you dropped, you were dead. Countless trees, rivers, and boulders occasionally flew up in Sonic's face. There was a sudden strong gust of wind as he turned so he was running the opposite direction the island was flying. For a moment, Sonic looked down and saw a very long fall, for he was running on air. Quickly he looked at the next boulder and spun into it with a homing attack. But the near fall didn't stop Sonic from continuing to run on the edge, for the real world had never felt so real.

Yes, fun and games on Angel Island was the perfect vacation after what Sonic had later learned what had been almost three days in an M play pen. Nothing in the real world was ever naturally slick with…

Sonic skid to a near halt and turned inland. He jumped high into a tree and came down with a tinted blue glow stick in his hand. "That's one."

* * *

The other two Sonic colored glow sticks would be a bit harder to find. When Sonic thought about what Knucks had said, he searched in the Lava Reef Zone but got little results. "What was I thinking?" Sonic stopped at the first stream and waded in the cool water. "That glow stick would have melted by now if it was in there." Then he thought of a place where it would never melt.

From the tallest mountain in Ice Cap Zone, you could still see the sunset on Mobius, but Sonic still couldn't find either of his glow sticks. He sat down in the snow. "If I was Knuckles, and trying to hide a glow stick from me, where would_ I_ put it?"

"Hi Sonic!"

"Tails!" Sonic glanced over his shoulder. "Any luck finding yours?"

He nodded and held forward two yellow sticks. "I found Cream and Amy a bit ago, working together."

"Ooh!" Sonic smirked. "I guess we'll have to work together too."

Tails landed. "So have you had any luck? Where have you looked?"

"Whatever you do, don't bother with the volcanoes." Sonic flipped his green glow stick in the air, then dropped it in the snow. "Anything in there would melt."

"Yeah, I guess you're right. How many do you have?"

Sonic kicked up the green glow stick. He caught it with one hand and pulled the other out of hammer space with the other. "Just the one!"

"Well, it just so happens that_ I_ know where another of your sticks is, but you're not going to like it too much." Tails shivered a tiny bit, in doing so fluffing out all his fur.

"I've always thought you look funny when you do that," Sonic snickered. Ok, spill it. What's the bad news?"

Tails held up one of his glow sticks. "I found this one in Hydrocity, right next to yours."

"Well then, we'd better get there fast!" Sonic grabbed Tails's hands and the two of them were zooming through Hydrocity Zone in no time. Tails directed them towards where he'd found the glow sticks.

"_Much_ easier to get up here with your help." Tails said as Sonic picked up the object they'd come back here for. "I wonder if Knuckles meant us to work together?"

"Maybe," Sonic jumped and slid down from the elevated hiding spot. "I know_ I_ wouldn't have been able to get up there, with all that algae on the wall. _Much_ too slimy."

Tails nodded as he flew down. "And I only just _barely_ got past those speed traps the first time through. It's possible, I guess."

"Where's the next glow stick?" Sonic asked as they entered the Marble Garden.

Tails shrugged. "I don't know, but as soon as we find one or the other glow stick, then one of us is going to split."

"Aww, I wouldn't do that to you Tails. We'll just have to make sure we find yours first so I still have a running chance against you." Sonic winked.

"I'm almost as fast as you are, except for that time the other day when Jet and his extreme gear…"

"Say no more, Tails." Sonic's ears twitched. "I hear something."

Tails listened. "I don't hear anything," he whispered.

"Shhh…" Sonic pulled Tails behind an old, subsiding pillar.

Both hedgehog and fox breathed very quietly. After about a minute, Tails heard it too. With the noises so soft, they sometimes doubted that something was there, but then they'd hear it again.

Sonic turned Tails's face towards himself. He mouthed the words, "I think it changed."

Tails nodded and mouthed back, "It sounds like a bird flying but not going anywhere."

_Giggle._

Tails glanced up, but didn't move his head. A dark silhouette of an unknown shape hovered above him, barely outlined in dim green.

"What?" Sonic mouthed, looking confused.

Tails discretely pointed up. He saw Sonic glance and nod. Sonic then held up three fingers. Two. One.

Sonic leaped around the pillar and Tails soared into the air. Sonic waved the green glow stick at the dark figure before him. "Halt, intruders!"

"AHH!" She waved back a humongous hammer.

"Amy?" Sonic lowered his arm.

"And Cream." Tails landed behind him. "And Cheese."

"Sonic!" Amy's hammer vanished. "You scared me!"

"Tails, are you hearing this?" Sonic faced Tails and pointed to her with his thumb. He looked back at Amy. "I thought you guys were going to scare us!"

"That's right, Mr. Sonic." Cream curtsied, but when she stood up, there was a polite smirk on her face. "Did we succeed at all?"

"Well," Tails scratched his head. "You kind of gave it away when I heard you giggling."

"Oops…" Cream folded her hands and stared down.

"Chao, chao." Cheese patted her on the back.

Amy walked over and hugged the little rabbit. "Next time, Cream. Next time."

"Next time?" Sonic raised an eyebrow.

Tails laughed. "Ok Amy. You've had your fun. Why did you guys come and find us?"

"We found the rest of the glow sticks." Cream was smiling again.

"But we need you guy's help to get them." Amy pointed her hammer at the guys. "They're the bait in a very complicated trap. There's no doubt Knuckles wanted us to work together."

"Hold the phone," Sonic held out a pair of dark glow sticks that were tinted blue. "Anyone else?"

Tails held one in each hand. Amy held up both of hers in one hand. Cheese had both of the glow sticks Cream had found so far.

Sonic put his unlit ones back into hammerspace. "How ironic."

"Don't congratulate yourself _yet_, Sonic." Amy spun around on her toe, tossing sparkles and harts around. "You're not the _only_ one with super speed."

"A fact that you both fail to recognize," Tails stood by Cream. "You'd both have to dodge obstacles, while we'll be flying right over them."

"Oh, that's right!" Cream turned to Amy. "There's a chance that even I might get there first!"

"I have a great idea." Sonic held his hands up. "How about we stop talking and find out!"

* * *

Amy hadn't been exaggerating when she said the trap was _very_ complicated. It even had a note from Knuckles, which read:

_Congratulations. Whoever finds this note first, please save yourself the humiliation of… (well you'll just have to find out, won't you?) and go get the others. You WILL need their help._

_Knuckles_

"The guy likes to be brief, doesn't he?" Sonic shrugged after reading the note aloud. He rolled it up. "What have you ladies found out so far?"

"The first trap is a light trap." Cream pointed out all the lit up mirrors. "If the light is blocked in any way, Mr. Knuckles's trap will spring on us." She picked up a hand full of dust and flung it towards the bundle of unlit glow sticks sitting on the top of a small round statue. Naturally, it started to fall about half way there, lighting up a fence of light around and above the goal. "Cheese found a way to turn off the lights."

"Chao!" Cheese flew over and sat beside an odd looking flower. He pushed the center of it. The glowing fence instantly disappeared before the dust finished settling.

"So then I tried to go over there, but it's in a quick sand swamp. Cream was going to fly me over, until we discovered the trees."

"Trees?" Sonic looked up. Strangely the canopy of tropical trees covered the entire area. Even stranger was the wire network up there. "let me guess. If you touch those wires, you set off the trap."

"I might be able to disable that one, if I knew where the control box was." Tails rubbed his chin.

"Ok." Sonic nodded. "How are we getting across the quick sand with those branches so low anyway?"

Cream pointed to a high, outstretching limb. "That branch is covered in wires, but there is a button up there that says 'bridge'. I could fly up there and push the button."

"Then that leaves just you and me to get the goods." Sonic looked at Amy.

Amy nodded. "That's right."

"So, do you know where the box is to deactivate those wires?" Tails asked. "We need to get this show of the road!"

"Right." Amy pointed to a tree with her hammer. "On the other side of that tree."

"Thanks." Tails ran behind it. He pulled the top off the box and whistled. "Knuckles, where did you get one of these?"

"What's that lil' buddy?" Sonic called.

"I'm going to have to hold a couple of short wires together to deactivated it. No chance of tying them." Tails used two sets of tweezers to hold the short wires so that they just barely touched. "I think I've got it!" He looked around the tree. "Go for it, Cream!"

Cream jumped up and flew towards the button. She pushed it and looked down. The quick sand bubbled for one second. "Nothing happened."

"Try holding it in." Amy suggested.

Cream held the button in. The sand bubbled until a narrow strip of it seemed solid. "I think it worked!"

"Way to go, Cream!" Sonic gave her a thumbs up.

"Come on, Sonic!" Amy grabbed his arm and pulled him to the center island.

Sonic freed himself and took a closer look at the glow sticks. "Hmmm… This reminds me of a movie I once saw…"

Amy grabbed the glow sticks. "I've got them!" She handed the blue on to Sonic. "Sonic?"

Then she saw it. On the statue they had been just sitting on, the glow sticks had been covering a small rod that now began to rise.

Sonic slammed both hands over the rod. It stopped rising. He smiled.

* * *

"Knuckles?" Vanilla turned to him. "Is something wrong?"

"Hmmm?" He put another log on the fire and smiled. "No. I just got a message."

"What message would that be?"

Knuckles grinned. "That everyone is about to get the surprise of their lives."

"Nothing dangerous, I hope."

"Not dangerous, no way!" He shook his head. "I'd never do that to Cream or Cheese. Maybe the others, but not them." He looked at her with a smirk on his face. "It's not dangerous, but it _will_ be funny. You'll know it when you hear them coming. Now if you excuse me, I have a few unfortunate souls to go rescue."


	3. Chapter 2 Myth Of The Red Ring

Myth of the Red Ring

"Sonic! The rod is sinking!" Amy pointed to the rod. "Don't push so hard!"

He lifted his hands slightly, then took them off completely.

"What's happening over there?" Tails called from behind the tree.

"It's still sinking!" Sonic scooped up Amy and ran back across the bridge. "Cream! Get down here! We have to get out of here as fast as we can! Tails?"

Tails jumped out from behind the tree. "It looks a little late for that guys…" He pointed to a raising cloth wall encircling the entire clearing.

"Cheese!" Cream flew down near everyone. "You can stop holding the flower now." She joined everyone in taking a step back from the cloth wall. "Do you think this is Mr. Knuckles's trap for us?"

"It has to be," Sonic rubbed a bit of the cloth between his fingers. "Only a Knucklehead like him would use such an easy to rip open canvas. Stand back everyone!" He spun into the wall. The canvas heaved and threw him back into the quicksand.

Everyone ducked. Amy grabbed Sonic's hand. "Only a _Knucklehead_ would use such an easy to spin through canvas, huh?"

"Whatever! So he called what I would do." Sonic pulled himself out of the muck with her help. "Wait a minute! Where did that thing the sticks were on go?"

"It must have sank." Tails took another step away from the wall.

By now, the raising curtain had pushed them all to the outer edge of the quick sand and was tugging at their shoes.

Cream was the first to lean over the edge. "Everyone! I think the quicksand is draining!"

"You're right!" Tails lost balance and flew over the sinking sand. "And it's starting to swirl!"

"Chao, chao. Chao! Chao!" Cheese pulled Cream off her perch so she had to fly.

"Uh, guys?" Amy looked at them. "The rest of us can't fly."

"Yeah, little help?" Sonic looked to Tails.

"Jump!" Tails held out his hands.

Sonic and Amy jumped, each grabbing onto the hands of their sidekicks. The curtain jerked upward, no longer held down by the two hedgehogs.

_Click!_

"That can't be good." Tails looked up.

The tree branch canopy that had so perfectly covered the area suddenly shivered and collapsed.

"AAAHHH!" Tails, Cream, Cheese, Sonic and Amy were all pushed down into the sand slide, then all sound became drowned silence. The sand quickly filtered out into water, and the five of them found themselves being thrown about in an underground water slide which eventually leveled out into a lazy river type deal, but still underground. As soon as heads broke the water's surface, someone bumped into an inner tube to which they all clung to, except Cheese who sat on it. For a few moments all anyone could say was cough cough cough.

"Every… one alright?" Tails's voice asked in the pitch blackness.

"Chao," Cheese spoke with a shivery voice.

"I'm fine," Cream said calmly. "I can't believe Mr. Knuckles scared us so!"

"You're telling me!" Amy's voice almost echoed off invisible walls. "Just wait until you see what I'm going to do to him!"

"How about you, Sonic?" Tails put his hand on the hand to his right.

"Other side." Amy said.

Sonic swallowed one last cough. "I'll be alright, little buddy," he croaked. Sonic grabbed Tails's hand, to his own right. "After I… Does anyone else see that light?"

"It looks like a sign!" Cream blinked in the dim light.

"Chao!"

Tails turned his head. "What does it say?"

Sonic squinted in the darkness. "'Close your eyes'? Maybe?"

"I've got a _bad_ feeling about this." Amy looked over her shoulder to read the sign.

"Chao! Chao! Chao!" Cheese jumped off the inner tube.

"Cheese!" Cream raised one hand towards the chao.

The light from the glowing sign passed overhead. Almost everyone screamed mildly again as the inner tube they clung to tipped over a waterfall. The side of the tube that Sonic and Tails hung on to bumped them against the wall, and they landed on but rolled off a slanted grate into which all the water drained. Transportation and passengers found themselves suddenly splashed into a sweet smelling warm liquid, like a huge bubble bath that two feet deep.

Sonic jumped out of the bubble bath, only to land back in it. Bubbles came up almost to his shoulders. "Great! Knuckles's idea of fun!"

"Cheese!" Cream called up the shaft of the waterfall, treading water to keep her head above. "Cheese, are you alright?"

"Chao!" He still sounded way up there.

"Yuck!" Amy stood on tiptoe and lifted her arms out of the bubbles. "What _is_ this stuff?!"

"Beats me." Tails was swimming without difficulty.

A bright light opened up above them. "Greetings!" Knuckles shown a huge flashlight down on them. "I see everyone is here. Do you all have your glow sticks?" He snickered.

"What's so funny, Knucklehead?!" Sonic pointed at him, furious. "We all fell for your..."

"AHH!" Amy screamed. "I'm green!"

"What?" Sonic pulled one of his lower quills forward, it was orange.

"Sonic!" Tails giggled. "I've turned blue!"

"Wow, Cream! You've turned a whole rainbow of colors!" Amy began sloshing her way over to Knuckles. "As for you…"

"Don't kill me!" Knuckles took a step back and shone the flash light in her face. "The game isn't over!"

"Just wait until YOU are over!" Amy ducked out of his flashlight beam.

"Oh that's right!" Cream turned to see Amy. "Amy, you still have the rest of our glow sticks!"

"Catch!" Amy brought them out and tossed them around.

Sonic lifted and counted all three of his dim glow sticks. "Last one to the Master Emerald gets to be on KP!"

"You're on!" Amy jumped out the door as Knuckles stepped aside.

Tails leaped out of the water and flew, flinging droplets of the bath everywhere. "Hurry up, Sonic!"

Sonic jumped closer and closer to the entrance. "You coming Cream?"

She was still at the back of the cavern. "I'm going to wait for Cheese!"

"Are you ready to eat your words, Sonic?" Knuckles taunted him.

"Let's see how YOU look in an embarrassing color!" Sonic grabbed his arm and threw Knuckles into the bubble bath, pulling himself out of it in the process. Sonic followed the multi-colored foot prints leading through the woods. Parts of the bushes seemed brighter than others, as though the dye on Amy's gloves and dress still had an effect on the wildlife. As soon as the bushes and trees broke, Sonic lifted his eyes to see Amy climbing the first few steps and Vanilla watching intently. He bolted for the Master Emerald.

"BASE!" Sonic and Amy slapped soggy red glowing hand prints on top of the Master Emerald in the exact same instant.

"Oh, Dear! Looks like a tie." Vanilla nodded. "Do you remember what to do now?"

Both summoned three glow sticks. Sonic snapped them one by one while Amy took them all and slapped them across the edge of the Master Emerald. She rapidly waved them over her head in a mad circle. "I'M A HOKEY POKEY!"

"NOOO!" Sonic held up his last dim glow stick. "One left! Just one left!"

Amy's mouth dropped open. "You mean I actually beat you?"

Vanilla nodded. "It seems you did, Amy."

"WHOOPIE!" She leaped in the air.

"GOTCHA!" Tails caught Amy's hands.

"Tails!" Amy kicked her feet. "Put me down! What are you even doing here?"

He smiled, and set her down softly. "In case you hadn't noticed, there are now _three_ hand prints on the Master Emerald!"

Sonic toppled off the shrine with laughter. He stood up and gave Tails a high five. "That was awesome!"

"Oh Yeah!" Amy crossed her arms. "Way to burst my bubble guys!"

"Don't worry, Amy dear." Vanilla spoke softly. "Cream and Cheese still aren't here yet."

"She quit. Cream is waiting for Cheese back in the cavern." Amy glanced at Vanilla. "Speaking of, how come _you_ aren't surprised about our outrageous colors?"

"Because I told her all about _it_!" A very green, very cross Knuckles stood dripping wet at the edge of lantern light.

"Oh look!" Sonic pointed, still hilarious from Amy's ironic defeat. "A talking Christmas tree!"

Amy giggled. "He deserved it!"

Sonic glanced at Knuckles and started walking backwards. "Sorry, got to go!"

"Get back here!" Knuckles ran after him. Both of them disappeared in the trees.

"They'll be gone a while." Tails sat in the grass. He sighed, smiling.

Amy sighed and put her hands on her hips, still watching the glowing bushes. "If supper is ready, I say we eat before it gets cold."

"Almost," Vanilla nodded. "All we need to do is dish up."

"MAMA!" Cream flew in over the tree tops and gave her mother a big hug. "I'm a rainbow!"

Vanilla laughed, swinging her daughter around in a circle. "You are! Look at me! Now I am too!"

* * *

"You guys done fighting?" Amy held an old fashioned video tape in her hands.

Sonic sat with his arms crossed and ribbons of pink mud all over his face. Knuckles stood on the opposite edge of the blanket, also streaked with strange dirt. Tails and the girls had eaten supper around the campfire, listening to the background noises of a destructive high speed pursuit.

Knuckles shrugged. "As guardian of Angel Island, I must inform you that it is my duty (and is _some_ cases a privilege) to throw off _any_ and _all_ who _insist_ on disturbing the peace." He glared at Sonic.

"While my _second_ best bud has to be _so_ formal," Sonic idly flipped a glowing blue stick in the air, resting the urge to smirk or even glance at Knuckles. "I respect the Knucks man's love of peace, as long as he still welcomes visitors."

"Well," Amy blinked, her face softening. "I guess that's a good sign." She stood on tiptoe. "Tails? Is it working? Ah!" She suddenly shielded her eyes from a blinding blue light outlining her against a hanging white sheet.

"It's working!" Tails called down from the midst of a tree. "The projector is hooked up to the VCR without popping a fuse this time. We're ready to, in true meaning of the phrase, ROLL FILM!"

"Well then, here!" Amy walked out of the blue light, shading her eyes and holding up the movie. "Plug it in and let's be on our way!"

"What movie is this, Mr. Sonic?" Cream asked.

"Cartoons, Cream." He stretched out on the ground. "I think you'll like them."

"Then they would have to be some rather old cartoons." Vanilla sat beside behind Cream. "Seeing how you have a video _tape_."

"Really old, like ten years old." Sonic nodded.

Tails looked at the label, then slid it into the machine. "Sonic? How did you _get_ one of these? I thought that was impossible!"

"Ok," Knuckles sat down cross legged. "Now you have me curious."

"SHHH!" Amy sat beside Cream and Vanilla. "Don't talk over the movie!"

Corny music started to play from above, and the blue light on the blanket draped on a rope strung between two trees turned dark. The face of a red falcon with a sand colored beak faded in.

_Impossible?_ Sonic wanted to ask Tails. Sonic almost felt guilty when he thought of how he hadn't told Tails the first Tornado had actually been _the_ Aerial Seal's Falcon Wing.

The adventure started on the white blanket, as usual, with a cartoon Dune and Arial flying their plane. In this adventure, they flew over the Cloud Poke Mountains in the east. Sonic had seen this movie so many times, he could almost chant along with the mechanical voice singing the theme song.

Vanilla glanced at Sonic with a question on her face. Dune's cartoon series had only been shown on TV once ever. Never in her life had she seen one for sale.

_The plane started to sputter._

"_Aerial? What is wrong with the engine?" Dune leaned impossibly forward to look under the top wing._

_Aerial's face appeared upside down. "Nothing that I can see. I think the air up here is too thin for the cooling system! That means we're going to crash!"_

_Dune straightened up and looked at the camera. "Oh no! If only one of us could fly! Oh wait! That would be me!"_

Cream giggled.

_Dune swooped forward, then slowed till he was side by side with the pilot's seat. "Quick Aerial! Climb on my back!"_

_Aerial Seal jumped on Dune's back and they veered away. The plane flew for a little more and then crashed into a snow drift. Aerial smiled. "Looks like our Falcon Wing can be repaired. Let's go check it out!"_

_Dune pulled out his famous icon, a big bright red gem the shape of a diamond. "Bah da Da RA bah Dah! Let's go!" The jewel glowed red, and they shot towards the mountain much faster._

When the pair arrived at the Falcon Wing wreckage, they saw a strange little white rabbit poking around the plane. Dune asked him what he was doing there, but the rabbit just tapped the plane with a mysterious red ring and then disappeared. Suddenly Falcon Wing was all fixed. Aerial picked up the red ring and about this time Sonic fell into a snooze. But he could still see the movie rolling in his mind.

In the movie, the red ring turned out to be very dangerous. Throughout the course of thirty minutes, it made Aerial and several villagers go crazy when they got near it, and it almost killed Dune. Yet somehow, the cartoon still had enough jokes that had been forgotten a decade ago to make Cream, Tails, Vanilla, and even Amy and Knuckles giggle or smile every once in a while.

Sonic opened his eyes right near the end, when Aerial threw the ring like a Frisbee into the welcoming arms of the ocean.

"_Good riddance!" Aerial brushed her hands together._

_THE END_

"Hey, you." Amy poked Sonic in the side. "You slept through almost the whole thing. And it was _your_ movie!"

"Yeah, so?" Sonic sat up and rubbed his eyes. "I think I've seen it a million times, no big deal."

"You had an antique all this entire time and never told us?" Tails rolled over so he could see the back row.

"I don't have to tell you guys absolutely _everything_!"

"I remember watching these cartoons on TV, but I've never seen them anywhere else." Vanilla stroked Cream's soft hair. "How did you get it, Sonic?"

Sonic smiled. "I'm just special like that." He rubbed the fingers of his newly black gloves together. "Hey, Knucks! What kind of a dye was in that bubble bath anyway?"

"A very diluted one, fortunately. No one will even notice the day after tomorrow." Knuckles rubbed his hands together. "But if you try to wash it off, it might get thinner. However, getting it wet will also reactivate the color."

"In other words, 'Don't get wet.'" Amy yawned. "Oh. What time is it?"

Sonic looked at the stars. "Almost half passed eleven."

"Past time to get home to bed." Vanilla picked Cream up as she stood.

Cream half opened her eyes and reached down. "Cheese…"

Cheese flew up to Cream's arms.

"I'll give you guys a ride home." Tails stood up and led them to the Tornado.

"Do you even think there _is_ such a thing as the Red Ring?" Knuckles climbed the projector's tree. He pushed the eject button.

"You've got to rewind it first," Sonic called up. "And to answer your question, it was just a cartoon."

"And what would _you_ say if we found a Red Ring?" Amy asked. She was on her stomach, feet crossed and in the air while supporting her head in her hands.

Knuckles turned off the projector. "In all my experience as a treasure hunter, I've never found a Red Ring that could kill me, nor do I ever intend to."

"Same here," Sonic agreed. "I don't believe in Red Rings, Amy. Do you?"

Amy thought. "I don't know. I've seen some pretty strange things. I suppose it's possible…"

"Nah!" Sonic shook his head. "There's no such thing as a Red Ring. Oh listen, it rhymes."


	4. Chapter 3 Barn Fun

Barn Fun

Aunt Vickie wasn't really anyone's aunt, but they called her that for her auntie-ness towards everyone under the age of 46.

The submarine arrived at Atlantis Research Facility (otherwise known as ARF) six and a half minutes late. So for sixteen and a half minutes, Alwen paced around the bottom level of the house, fidgeting with his diving suit and wondering if he had everything he'd need. Of course, his parents were waiting with him, glancing at their watches in time with the rotating propellers of the approaching undersea shuttle. When the Captain Flip's head finally broke the surface, Alwen zipped up his wet suit, hugged his parents, shoved the regulator in his mouth, and jumped in the water. Flip laughed and held up his hands for the impatient boy's wet-bag.

The first time Alwen had been on a submarine ride, he cried in his mother's arms the whole way. This time, he enjoyed looking out the windows and talking with the crew, who together gave him a crash course in public social skills. Don't open doors that you don't know what's behind, always hold the door open for a lady, don't worry because you're going to have fun, and please don't fidget, we're almost there.

When they opened to top hatch, the wind hit them like a wave. Alwen's teeth chattered and his ears popped painfully, so they rushed him and the rest of the crew into the pressure chamber so they could properly adjust to sea level air pressure. Those few hours passed in a blur of sailor stories from the ports and towns on the piers.

* * *

Shortly before they were let out, a bright honey yellow van pulled up outside. Alwen exited the building and looked up to see a huge black bear with her arms out wide. "Hi Darling!" she gathered him up in a hug. "You look just like your father did when I had him at my house, so you must be Alwen!"

"Yes, lady." Alwen looked over her shoulder into the van. Two other kids smiled back at him and waved. The other girl was reading a book.

"You call me Aunt Vickie." She set him down and opened the sliding door of the yellow van. "Climb in, Little Fish."

"Sit by me!" The younger girl in the back scooted over. Her theme was orange. Orange face, orange hands, sunshine yellow tank top with cherry red shorts, hair bow, and sandals. The perfect picture of first grade.

"Ok," he smiled. Alwen ducked his head and sat on the bench beside her.

"Aunt Vickie took one look here and said, 'Well don't you look like something out of a candy store, Lollipop ' She called me Lollipop " She pointed to a fabric strap attached to the wall and bench. "Ain't you'd better put that on?"

Alwen looked at the strap. "How do I do that? Look, it goes into the car itself."

Lollipop clicked a button and the strap across her lap and shoulder zipped into the wall closer to her. "Like _this_." She grabbed the strap with one hand and a box on the bench with the other. She pushed a clip that was tied to the strap into the box until it clicked. "See? It be called a seat belt."

"Ah." Alwen copied her actions. His seat belt clicked. "You know, you look familiar somehow."

Lollipop's face twisted. "You got that wrong by far, 'cuz ain't no way I'd have never seen you and not remembered it. Ain't you from the ocean?"

"Everyone buckled up?" Aunt Vickie asked from the driver's seat.

"Buck us up and we ain't care, because we're buckled down back there!" A bouncing bat with his wings spread answered from the middle seat.

"Seriously, did you have to look at me while you said that?" The older gecko girl glared from over the edge of her book as the van began to roll. Her salmon colored scales reflected anger, and her voice was slightly mechanical.

"Absolutely ain't alive if I ever ain't alliterating!" He giggled. "How about you, Shutterbug? Plenty of pages for ya?"

She put one gecko finger on her page and closed the book."I'm about ready to slap you with this! You moron!" She held her book back, ready to strike.

"Ooh, none of that fighting talk, missie." Aunt Vickie's eyes appeared for a second in the rear view mirror. "You know Auntie's rules."

"You in big trouble now if ain't stop threatening to slap me. Aunt Vickie says." His voice sobered up as he pointed to her.

The girl glanced ahead. Aunt Vicky nodded back. "It wasn't even my choice to come." She opened the book again and continued to read.

Short silence. "Anyways…" The bat boy turned around in his seat and extended his clawed fingers towards Alwen. "Jack-o-Lantern."

"Little Fish." Alwen reached forward and shook his hand.

"You've still got you're diving gloves on." Lollipop raised an eyebrow. "So it's true that you ain't ever lived nowhere else but under the sea?"

"I was born on land." Alwen nodded. "But ever since then I've lived with my parents at ARF. Atlantis Research Facility."

"Sounds fun." Jack-o-Lantern crossed his arms under his chin.

"Sounds wet!" Lollipop bit her tong.

"Jack-o-Lantern, baby. Please face forwards." Aunt Vickie made a turn.

He turned back around in his seat.

"So," Lollipop bounced a little on the bench. "What be on your mind to do first when we get there?"

"Oh, I don't know." Something flashed by. Alwen glanced out the window. "What do you want to do first?"

"I already knows what I'm a gonna do! I'm gonna get myself unpacked, then ain't no one is gonna stop me from singing in the hay loft!"

"What's a hay loft?" Alwen looked back at her.

"Silly Little Fish!" Lollypop reached one kitty hand into his bangs and gave them a ruffle. "A hayloft is a loft of hay!"

* * *

"AAAHHH!"

Tails rolled over. "Amy? Was that really you who just screamed?"

Amy was sitting straight up, breathing quick deep breaths. She rubbed her eyes. "It was just a dream."

"What a nightmare." Sonic opened his eyes. "Amy woke us up because of a screaming dream."

"I guess it _was_ a nightmare," She pointed at Sonic, across the pit of ashes. "And it's your fault!"

"Really?" Sonic sat up. "Pray tell."

"You shouldn't have showed us that movie last night! It gave me nightmares! The Red Ring was real and it KILLED YOU!"

"What's the world coming to when Amy is mad at Sonic for showing her a movie?" Tails pulled one of his tails over his eyes. "And with that scream of hers, I wouldn't be surprised if Knuckles is on his way here right now to see what the trouble is."

Sonic laughed. "Yeah, Knucks leaves the Master Emerald out in to open and hypes himself up to come charging to our rescue! But all that's to be afraid of is Amy's nightmare. Boohoo."

"Oh, well if that's the way it is," Amy glared back at him, but there was a gleam in her eye. "You're saying that you think Knuckles thinks you're a wimp."

"Ooh!" The talking pile of greenish orange fur poked his nose towards Amy. "Nice one."

"Not as nice as the fact that he's almost here." Sonic sat back against a tropical tree.

"Huh?" Tails poked his eyes out and blinked.

Knuckles glided over the fire pit and landed on the other side of the camp. He leaned forward panting for a bit. "There's a fire."

"And you saw it from, where?" Amy stood up and rubbed her eyes.

"Standing at the edge of Drop Dead zone."

"Must be time to go." Sonic jumped to his feet and yawned. "Tails, can you fly us there?"

"The Tornado is that a way." Tails pointed with his left hand. "You go ahead, I'll finish waking up and join you later."

"Then I'm coming with you!" Amy stood up.

"Thanks anyway, little buddy." Sonic grabbed Amy's hand and they ran to the plane.

Both hedgehogs jumped in and buckled up. Sonic quickly looked over the pilot's controls.

"What's wrong? I thought you knew how to fly this thing!" Amy leaned forward.

Sonic shook his head slightly and flicked on the engine. "Nothing, it's just that Tails must have made a couple modifications since last time." He clicked various other buttons and switches before starting the propeller. His hand brushed the control stick and the wing flaps jumped. "Not to mention he made it a _bit_ more sensitive!" He shouted to make himself heard over the noise of the engine. Sonic steered the plane's nose towards what little runway they had. Then he put his hands around the control stick and thrust it forward.

The Tornado rolled over the edge of Angel Island and dove towards Mobius.

"THERE IT IS!" Amy pointed over Sonic's shoulder to a glowing orange dot on the dimming eastern edge of the northern continent.

"I SEE IT!" Sonic pushed the Tornado into almost a full nose dive.

Rivers and oceans and forests and grass lands expanded, then quickly transformed into dollhouse like models, then they were flying through everything in a real life, real speed, experience.

"GET READY TO JUMP!" Sonic shouted, keeping his eyes on the flaming building.

Amy punched the big red button in the middle of her seat belt and slowly climbed up to the brim of her cockpit. "READY!"

The plane slowed down slightly over a dense woodland. The woods changed to a road carved through yellow fields, then a tall looming silo.

"JUMP!"

Amy let go of her seat and extended her knees. The wind continued to carry her before the Tornado's shock wave hit. A prone sky diver almost by necessity, Amy was unfazed by the draft and aimed for the half of a large barn which still wasn't on fire. She summoned her hammer and bashed a hole in the roof.

Two terrified children cowered in the corner from the consuming flames that had already eaten up half the hayloft. One of them pointed down. "There be wheat below our feet!"

"Grab on!" Amy hugged them both and jumped back out the hole she'd made.

The barn exploded, propelling the trio back onto the hard ground where they belonged, but where they were not welcomed warmly. Smoke puffed out of the children's noses and mouths as the hard packed dirk knocked their breath away.

Amy coughed until she could breathe again. "Is everyone," she coughed again, "ok?" she asked in a slightly raspy voice.

Instantly a pair of huge hands put Amy on her feet. She turned around and saw a huge black bear wearing a not so bright yellow dress. Other children looked over the ash black pair Amy had just pulled out of the fire.

"Darling, you are a brave little girl!" The big black bear gave Amy a big black bear hug. "Now tell me your name so we can celebrate the rescue of two of Aunt Vickie's dearest babies!"

Amy wiggled free. Everyone was watching her. She curtsied. "I'm Amy."

"Ah me?" One of the black soot covered children coughed and rubbed some of the blackness from around her eyes. "Amy Rose? Ain't not the _same_ Amy Rose that I done dome bustin' with?"

"I ain't believe it," the bat boy with her gawked.

Amy took a second look at them. "Frankie and Jack! I never thought we'd see you two again! What are you doing getting into trouble so soon?"

"Pardon me," the salmon colored gecko girl stepped closer. "If you are Amy Rose, aren't you supposed to be pink?"

"Huh?" Amy looked down. Her dress and boots had still looked more dark green with a red tinge than what they used to be like, that is to say nothing of her hair. "Oh, never mind that. _This_ is what I get for playing along with Knuckles on his own turf!" She showed her hammer, still the same as ever. "But here I am, hope I didn't confuse you."

The air stirred. "Did I miss all the fun?" Sonic skid to a halt.

"Sonic!" The other fire rescue kid found his voice. "Why are you orange?"

"Well, I say! Why did we see her," the gecko gestured to Amy, "long before we saw you? That barn exploded a whole minute ago! These two would have been dead now if it wasn't for Amy!" She put her hands on the shoulders of Frankie and the other kid from the fire.

Sonic frowned and crossed his arms. "And who do you think got Amy here so fast?"

"You have no right to be angry!" Amy scolded. "Tails was too tired to come so Sonic flew the plane! And I'll bet Sonic flew that baby much faster than Tails ever would have! I certainly couldn't have done it without him!" Amy stood beside Sonic

"Pedal to the metal." Sonic nodded. "Zero to 600 in six seconds. But that's not the important part. The important part is that we're a team, and everyone is safe."

"I couldn't have said it better myself! So is that it then? No more on the way?" Aunt Vickie looked back and forth between Sonic and Amy.

Sonic scratched his head. "Didn't Tails say he would join us?"

"I'll give him a buzz to tell him to that there's no need." Amy flicked her hammer away.

"Oh good!" Aunt Vickie clapped her massive paws. "In the meantime, how about the rest of us go inside for a nice cold glass of lemon aid? Supper will be on the table real quick!"

"Now that is what I call cool!" Sonic gave her a thumbs up.

The lizard girl smiled, then instantly grabbed a camera and snapped a picture

"I hope you don't give that to the local press," Sonic looked at her as they all walked towards the farm house.

She shook her head and jogged ahead.

Amy squeezed the sides of the cam com tied to her wrist like a watch. The screen flipped open. "Tails?"

Tails's face appeared slightly fuzzy on the screen, eyes half closed as though still drenched in sleep. "Who are you?"

"Don't you remember what Knuckles dumped us all into?" Amy huffed. "Well, I called to tell you that you can have your beauty sleep. Sonic and I have things cleared up around here."

"Oh, good." Tails disappeared when the image cut to black.

"Hmmm…" Amy closed her own cam com. "I guess he was more tired than he thought." She turned around, startled to see the other kid still standing there. "Why are you still here?"

He closed his eyes, wiped off some of the soot, and extended a hand. "You saved my life, thank you."

"Uh, your welcome." Amy shook his hand. A half melted wet suit glove crinkled in her grasp.

"My name is Alwen."

"You're welcome Alwen. Let's get you inside so we don't get in the firemen's way. Ok?" Amy glanced around as the bright red trucks arrived to put out the remaining barn cinders and several brush fires that had sprung up after the explosion.

"Whatever you say," he said with a misted look in his aqua blue eyes.

* * *

Fireman Dallas loosened his jacket and took off his helmet. After stomping his boots and checking to make sure the kids hadn't left their shoes outside, he opened the door to the farmhouse and followed the happy chatter emanating from the kitchen. Six kids sat around the table while Aunt Vickie refilled glasses of milk and plates of cookies. He smiled and nodded to Aunt Vickie. Turning his attention to the children, he asked, "Would anyone like to explain how it started?"

Frankie and Alwen had since bathed and washed the soot out of their fur and hair. Alwen took a sip of milk, looking over the top edge of his glass to the cat. Frankie shrugged. "I guess I get to go first." She leaned back in her chair a little bit. "It all started like this, sir. When Little Fist here up an sits beside me in the van, I start like saying there's ain't no better place on them firms than them barn haylofts. He ain't never been out from under water before, cuz he's been living with his folks in an undersea lab. Then we get here and get unpacking for school, and when we is done, I took him out to see that there used-to-be barn loft. I give him the lantern to hold, and we climb the ladder because he says he's good at ladders and can do it with one hand. Well, we get up there and ain't one minute before I hear him scream that his hand ain't no wet hot cakes anymore. So he throws the lantern away!"

"I didn't say it like _that_!" he grumbled. "And that lantern was hot! It was melting through my glove!"

Jack held his arm up, fist level with arm. "Were you holding it like this," he pointed his fist down, "or this?"

"Like this." Alwen pointed his fist down. "But with my arm relaxed."

"Well then it's your own fault! Didn't your mama ain't never tell ya how to handle fire?" Frankie put her hands on the table and leaned forward.

Alwen frowned. "We live in the ocean. She teaches me how to handle knives."

"You handle knives? And you're how old?" Shutterbug, also known as Patty the Gecko, opened her eyes large at this.

"What's the matter? You're not old enough to handle a knife?" Alwen tossed back at her.

"I am older than you! So shut up!"

"Hey! Aunt Vickie doesn't like her cubs having hissy fits!" Aunt Vickie shook her spoon at them. "Now behave all, or not a one of you is gonna get anymore cookies while you're here."

"And when the flames fell into the grain powder, what was left of the barn exploded." Fireman Dallas nodded to Frankie. "Thanks for the back story, honey." He turned to Sonic and Amy. "You two have been awfully quiet."

"Oh, don't mind us." Sonic put his last half cookie back on his plate and motioned to Amy. "She and I just got here."

"And we probably won't be staying long." Amy dipped her cookie in her milk.

Dallas looked between them, totally unaware of who they really were. Jack smiled and giggled. The fireman opened his mouth to say something.

Sonic shook his head. "Before you ask, yes, you _have_ seen me on TV before. The bizarre color is the result of a prank."

"A prank?"

"Yep." Sonic nodded. "Say, have your people finished putting out the flames yet?"

"Well, I wouldn't be here if they hadn't."

Sonic looked back. "Aunt V? What all was in that shed?"

"Nothing of more importance than who you rescued." She mentally took inventory. "Just wheat grain and the seed potatoes."

"Potatoes? Really?" He scooted his chair back and set his feet on the floor.

"I'm sure they're all cooked now."

"Perfect." Sonic stood up. "Come on everybody!"

"Sonic," Amy scooted back. "What do you have in mind?"

He smirked. "Haven't you ever wanted to play Hot Potato with real potatoes?"

Jack's face lit up. "Awesome! I wanna play! I wanna play!"

"Ain't no way you're starting without me!" Frankie jumped out of her chair.

"Forget it," Patty huffed. "I'm going to my room."

"How about it, Little Fish?" Frankie asked.

Alwen shrugged and shook his head. "Why not?" He stood up.

They all skipped and ran outside, except for Patty who retired to her room grumbling a little too loudly how immature Mobius's finest heroes could be.

Aunt Vickie walked with Dallas to the door. "I know I'll always be a fan of anyone, young or old, who can make the best out of something lost."

From the door, they could see Sonic digging around in the charred barn until he found some potatoes and tossed them out. Everyone started yelling, "Hot Potato! Hot Potato!" as they tossed the little black objects back and forth to each other.

Dallas nodded. "It was well said, 'There isn't any great loss without some small gain.' I've tried my best to teach that to my kids, even when their toys get taken away."

"I'm no teacher, but I sure love my kids." Aunt Vickie smiled. "All about a hundred of them now.

Probably because they kept begging for it, Sonic ran to get another potato every time one wasn't heading towards him. Eventually there were exactly twelve potatoes and no clean faces. After the midnight picnic, only a heaping pile of charred potato skins remained.


	5. Chapter 4 Stowaway

Stowaway

The weird thing about Angel Island is that it's constantly changing time zones. If you lived there like Knuckles, you'd eventually adjust to the rapid dash the sun made across the sky every day, and the way the stars crossed heaven much faster than before. 'Hide as Seek' had been during one of those day then night days, wake up in the evening the next day. So even though it was bed time for everyone else on Aunt Vickie's farm, Sonic and Amy had just woken up.

After the moon lit picnic, Frankie rubbed her eyes and fell over. Alwen had never seen the stars for real before, so he and Jack stayed up with Sonic while he entertained them with constellations and other astronomical phenomenon all night. By breakfast the next morning, Sonic received a slight scolding for keeping Aunt Vickie's cubs awake until the wee hours. After all, school started in three days. Then Sonic's cam com beeped mid statement.

"I'm not done talking to you. You can tell your friends to wait." Aunt Vickie shook her finger

"And what if it's someone in trouble?" Sonic opened the cam com and stepped back in shock. "I have _got_ to take this one."

"Who is it?" Amy looked over his shoulder.

Sonic showed her his wrist. "I'll give you one good guess."

**EGG**

"Hello?" Sonic did not turn on the camera.

Eggman's face did not appear. "Hello Sonic. I haven't heard from you in a while."

"It's only been two days, Egghead. Who taught you how to count?"

"My mo… Oh shut up! Aren't you more curious to know _how_ I called you?"

"Not really, but I have a bad feeling you're about to tell me."

"You have been hacked, hedgehog! Now I can listen in on all those networking conversations you and your rodent friends used to have!"

"You _seriously_ didn't_ just_ call me to brag about hacking a sixteen bit micro cell phone system, did you? What else is in your mustache?"

"I need your help."

"That's a first," Amy crossed her arms.

"Let me guess," Sonic rubbed his chin. "You want me to come to your town so I can spring some trap you've got waiting for me?"

"No, that's not it at all!" His voice shook a tiny bit. "One of my experimental destruction machines got lose and is heading towards York. People will get hurt before the robot is stopped, unless _you_ can catch up to it and stop it."

"Where is it?" Sonic asked.

"Just east of you over the ocean, flying at about four hundred miles per hour. You'll need to hurry hedgehog."

Sonic closed the flap. "'Hurry' he says."

"What's in it for him?" Amy wondered.

Aunt Vickie shooed them out the door. "Never mind what I said a minute ago. You get yourselves going to do what you do best. I'll tell the kids."

Amy followed Sonic to the empty wheat field where he had landed the plane. "I wish Tails were here. He knows the Tornado better than you."

"Angel Island is on the other side of Mobius by now." Sonic opened the cam com again. "But we _should_ let him know about Eggman."

Tails's face appeared. "What's up, Sonic?"

"Eggman hacked us." Sonic jumped into the pilot's seat.

"I understand." Tails nodded. "We should maintain radio silence over the entire network until I can get home and change the frequencies."

"Good."

"I'll tell Knuckles." Tails's face faded to black.

Sonic closed his cam com. "You ready back there Amy?"

"Of course!" Amy smiled. "I'm always ready for you."

"Of course..." Sonic started the engine, turned the Tornado around and they took off through Aunt Vickie's empty wheat fields.

Vast flat farms slowly transformed into growing cities. Sonic couldn't flying nearly as fast as last night, partially because it was Eggman who called and also because there had been no Angel Island to get a falling start from. They set off in a northeastward direction, a direct intercept course with Eggman's robot.

Amy sat back and stretched her legs. "AHH!"

"What is it?" Sonic glanced back.

"Get out of there!" Amy disappeared under the cockpit lip and pulled up the young turquoise hedgehog whom they'd met at the farm. "Adam?!"

"It's Alwen." He stood in front of her feet, their knees touching.

Sonic pushed the auto pilot button and turned around. "What are you _doing_ here?! How did you even _fit_ down there?"

"I fell asleep in your plane. I..." Alwen looked down. "I wanted to go on an adventure with you guys. You're the most interesting thing that's ever happened to me my whole life! I've been seeing you on the News, and when Amy pulled me out of the fire, I thought it was finally my turn." He turned twisted to face Sonic. "I want to help, you know, say thank you."

Sonic thought for a while. "How do you handle yourself, Alwen?"

"You're not _seriously_ thinking of letting him come, are you?" Amy asked.

"I gave up crying when I turned ten."

"How old are you now?" Amy crossed her arms.

He looked to her. "Twelve, the same as you."

Amy raised her eyebrows.

"Alwen," Sonic tapped him on the shoulder. "The stuff we do is usually too dangerous for most folks. What I meant was, what can you _do_?"

Alwen pulled his diving knife from his belt. "I know how to use this."

"Is that all?"

"I don't know!" Alwen scratched his head. "I haven't had much opportunity to try this stuff out."

"Catch!" Sonic held up a power ring.

Alwen put his hands in the air and was thrown onto Amy's lap by the air current. "Oh! I'm so sorry, Amy!"

She pushed him back up. "Just be careful of the wind next time."

Sonic let go of the ring.

Alwen caught in and held it in both hands. "Wow," he whispered. _I never imagined I'd ever be able to touch one of these. _He wobbled and shook his head.

"Now, make it go into hammerspace," Sonic instructed, quickly checking over his shoulder to see that there were still no obstacles in the Tornado's path.

"What's hammerspace?" he asked, still holding the ring.

"Look here." Amy pulled out a small version of her hammer, then made it vanish in front of him. "I sent my hammer into hammerspace."

Alwen's eyes widened. "You mean you can really do all that? Magical disappearing and reappearing of rings and the Chaos Emeralds and your hammers? I thought that was a TV trick!"

"Dude!" Sonic poked Alwen's shoulder. "Can you make that thing stick to you without putting it in your pocket?"

"How do I do that?"

Sonic opened his mouth, then stopped and itched his ear. "You know, I never thought about that part before. The first time I grabbed a ring, it disappeared instantly."

"It's hard to imagine a first time for you," Alwen said admiringly.

"Maybe I can explain it better." Amy pulled out her hammer again. "You just have to give yourself a mental nudge, then it just goes." The red and yellow hammer vanished once more.

"I'll try." A whole minute went by in silence as Alwen stared at the ring in his hands.

"It's not happening with you." Sonic reached for the ring.

Alwen handed it back to him. "So?"

"That means that the ring won't be protected in danger." Sonic spun it around his finger before making it go. "You can still come, if you promise to remain in the Tornado when we catch up with that robot."

"Ok, I promise."

"Sonic! Why…" Amy started to ask.

Sonic turned around and retook control of the plane. "Think about it Amy. What else can we do? If we turn back or land, we'll never catch that robot. And I_ hope_ you don't suggest we throw him off."

Alwen's eyes widened. "NO!"

"Of course not!" Amy shook her head. "But there are two people back here and only one seat."

Sonic nodded. "Ok then, Amy. Why don't you take the wing?"

"WHAT!? ARE YOU OUT OF YOUR MIND!? I've never ridden on top of the wing before!"

"There's always a first time." Alwen smiled at her, still standing.

"You'll be fine." Sonic glanced up at the Tornado's upper wing. "If I wasn't flying, I'd be up there right now!"

"Yeah, but I'm not as much of a dare devil as you!"

"Wana bet?" Sonic playfully glanced back at her. "Remember, I have the stick in my hands."

Amy huffed and unbuckled her seat belt. "I'm not even sure how this is going to work." She brought her feet onto the seat cushion. Very carefully, she walked her hands forward and slowly stood up a little. She climbed past Alwen. "_Excuse me_."

Alwen sat down in the passenger seat and tried to figure out the six point seat belt.

There were eighteen inches of space between the passenger and pilot's pits. Amy grabbed the back of Sonic's seat and crawled the fuselage. She reached up for the wing.

"You're doing great!" Sonic called up to her. Something beeped on one of the displays, quickly grabbing his attention. "Hang on!"

"What's wrong?" Amy glanced down, then up again and screamed. "SONIC!"

"IT'S THE ROBOT!" Alwen pointed with a trembling arm.

"Hope everyone's buckled!" Sonic turned the stick slightly, causing the Tornado to turn left.

Amy's boots slid to the right until they were over open air. "SONIC! HELP!" The wing tilted right with her unbalanced weight.

Sonic tilted the control stick left as far as it would go, leveling out the plain. "GET UP THERE AND HOLD ONTO THE FORWARD EDGE OF THE WING!"

Amy jumped and caught the forward edge, where she felt around and found a pair of handles mounted so coincidentally perfect for as if for just such an occasion. "I'VE GOT THEM!"

"GOOD! CUZ THING ARE ABOUT TO GET TOUGH!" Sonic twisted and tilted the stick to the right, spinning the plain as the robot started firing at them. He grabbed the another stick and sent back a few rockets.

Alwen shook his fist at the robot. "HAVE A FEW FISH! ROBO BOZO!"

"SHUT UP!" Amy screamed from the upper wing.

The robot scanned their trajectory and launched a spread to heat missiles.

The Tornado's engine exploded with black smoke. Sonic coughed and spun his seat belt to shreds. "ABANDON PLANE!" He jumped onto the wing and homing jumped at the robot's left booster.

Amy let go of the wing and slid back into the vacant pilot's seat. She reached back and pressed in the big red button in the middle of a panicking Alwen's chest. "Let's go!" She grabbed his hand and jumped out of the crashing plain. The two of them landed in a large bush. Amy leaped free and ran to the robot's feet.

Sonic kept the robot distracted by hopping from arm to arm to arm to arm, making faces at the giant camera lens on its head. Finally, it brought the arm Sonic was on closer to its eye. He jumped, spun, and propelled himself into the robot's eye.

The robot slapped itself in the face, causing it to lose balance and step back. As soon as it lifted a foot, Amy smacked the underside of it with her hammer. The whole thing toppled over into the ocean and short circuited, instantly exploding.

The head moved. Sonic appeared under the hand and tossed it aside. "All those arms and he still couldn't keep his balance!"

Alwen walked up to them, scratched and his outfit full of leaves. "THAT WAS AWESOME! You rock!" He was grinning at Amy, pumping his fists.

"Thanks!" Sonic smiled. "Now where did the Tornado go?" He walked away, following a thinning trail of smoke in the sky.

"You saved my life again."

"Huh?" Amy looked Alwen. She made her hammer go away.

"You pulled me out of the Tornado."

"No biggie." Amy turned away. "Let's go find Sonic."

"I think you're the best thing that's ever happened to me, Amy Rose." Alwen followed at arm's length.

Amy stopped, surprised. "What?"

Alwen came around and stood in front of her. "You are a rose greater than any before, and the best of those to come. Your sweet smell makes mermaids jealous, and flowers turn green with envy. Your face is brighter than the sun, and my world dims if I can't see you. And your voice sings the rhythms of my heart!" He was smiling hugely and there were double sets of twinkles in his aqua eyes. "Amy, I lo..."

"SONIC!" Amy ran as fast as she could, bolted towards a now steady column of gray smoke.

"Over here!" Sonic dropped half a torn wing from a mangled tree which had once been in the Tornado's flight path.

Amy stopped at the base of the tree. "We HAVE to send him back! NOW!"

"What's wrong?" He jumped down from the tree.

From the middle distance came the cry, "Amy! Come back please!"

Sonic looked to Amy. "What happened?"

"He's crazy!" Amy threw her hands in the air. "After you ran ahead, he started talking about roses and mermaids and compared me to the sun! Then he said my voice sang the rhythms of his heart!" She grabbed Sonic's hand. "Please! You have to help me!"

Alwen appeared in the bushes. His face lit up. "Amy!"

She looked pleadingly into Sonic's eyes.

Sonic turned, looking back and forth between them. Then he snorted and began to laugh hysterically. He pulled his hand out of Amy's and leaned against the tree.

"SONIC!" Amy folded her hands.

"What's so funny?" Alwen came closer confused.

"Oh,_ you_ wouldn't understand it." Sonic smiled. He looked up. "Feel free to stay with us for a while, Alwen. We could use the company."

Amy's mouth dropped open. "Sonic! You can't do this to me!"

Sonic winked at her.

"Hey!" Alwen pointed up in the direction of the robot wreckage. "What's that?"

Everyone looked. A tiny flying part of the robot's head flew towards them, very low, very fast.

"Whatever it is, stop it!" Sonic ran ahead of it.

Alwen jumped, and the thing flew right into his stomach. "Oof!" But he held on and was carried away.

Amy charged after the flying thing, eventually catching up with it and Sonic.

Sonic had matched speeds with it. "How you holding up big guy?"

"HANGING ON FOR DEAR LIFE!" Alwen wrapped his arms around it.

They followed it into a small meadow free of bushes and trees. The only thing in the meadow was a strange steel structure. As the flying thing swooped down to enter the low door, Alwen let go and rolled in the grass.

They caught up to him. "Are you ok?" Sonic asked.

"Yeah." Alwen breathed deeply. "I'm fine."

"Common." Sonic helped him up and the three of them went inside following the robot.


	6. Chapter 5 Threat Of The Red Ring

Threat of the Red Ring

Frankie slid down the side of the creek bank. "Jack? Is Little Fish around? I ain't seen him all day!"

Jack pulled up a critter crayfish from the depths of the murky creek. "Little Fish, dot, swish wish not in this spot. AHYEE!" He shook his right hand as the poor crayfish flew up in the air and splashed back under the water. "Owe! I ain't seen him all day neither. Owe."

Shutter Bug's face appeared in a tree over the creek. "I _felt_ that one! When are you going to learn your lesson?"

Jack glared up at Patty. "When you learn how ta' sing!"

Patty's long tong whipped out and around Jack's wings, then hauled him up into the tree. She released him him but still held him by her hands. "Listen you little brat! I don't take kindly to people who…"

All Jack's face paled and he pointed to something in the distance.

* * *

The steel shack was basically empty. There were four walls and the open door, all of equal lengths and angles so it formed a perfect pentagon inside. The roof was slightly vaulted, at the very top of which hovered the robot part that had flown here.

Sonic zipped inside. "Where did that thing go?"

"Look!" Alwen pointed up as he and Amy entered.

Sonic jumped and spun through the thing. It rained down on them in tiny bits and pieces. "Well, that's done." Sonic brushed his hands together.

A steel wall started to slam down where the door was. Sonic bolted, then slid under it and caught the new wall.

"Ahh!" Amy ran to Sonic. "It was a trap!"

"What do we do?!" Alwen cried at the door.

Sonic was on his back, his elbows pinned under the wall but keeping the steel barrier from shutting them out. "You could start by getting out of here and calling for help!"

"Sounds like a plan!" Amy lay flat on her stomach and put her head next to the door. "I can't get out!"

Alwen stood up from the other side. "Neither can I!"

"Great!" Sonic took a deep breath and held it. He pushed as hard as he could up on the door. It didn't move. "Phew!"

Amy knelt next to the door and put her hands under it. "Try again!"

Both of them pushed up on the door, Alwen joining in a second later. Teeth were ground and sweat pooled on their faces, but finally the wall began to rise. Sonic's arms were almost straight when he said, "Go, GO!"

Alwen and Amy crawled under the door. They helped lift the door another inch…

_Clunk!_

"What was that?" Alwen looked at Amy.

"The door won't go up anymore!" Sonic pushed harder. "I can't stand up. You'll have to go without me!"

"Not a chance!" Amy grabbed Sonic's foot.

"You do that and it'll come down on my head!"

Amy let go.

Sonic put his feet between his hands. He pushed the door back up until it stopped where it had before.

"I'm not leaving without you!" Amy took out her hammer and beat upon the wall.

"Amy! Amy stop!" Sonic shouted until she stopped. "You have to go! Get help. Get the Tornado back together. And don't worry about me! Egghead hasn't yet built something I can't destroy, right?"

Amy sighed. "Right." She grabbed Alwen's arm and they disappeared out of sight.

Sonic slowly let the wall go down to where it had been before. "Whew. Egghead sure knew what he was doing this time!"

A tiny critter song bird flew in and peeped at him.

"Peep back at you, little bird."

It peeped again and started hopping around with its head cocked to one side, looking for worms on the steel floor.

Sonic turned his head to see it better. "I don't think you're going to have much luck with that."

The little brown bird ignored him, insistent on its search for food.

"Trust me, grubs don't come from stainless steel. Not that _I've_ tried or anything." Sonic sighed. _That little bird is hopeless._

Suddenly the bird jumped up and flew away, crying out a warning. A soft buzzing sound entered the steel shack, like the sound of a swarm of bees from far away.

Sonic watched as several softball sized robots with wings entered under the crack in the wall. There were about fifteen or twenty of them. They gathered in a circle above his head. He blinked up at them. "Well, what are you waiting for? It's not like I'm going someplace."

The poor little bots were confused. After all, why wasn't Sonic at least trying to attack them? Worse yet, maybe this wasn't really Sonic. Sonic was always moving. The creature under them was staying perfectly still. But the tracking signal in the device on his left wrist was still transmitting, so this must be him.

They made the wall stop pressing down so hard, then stunned him.

* * *

When he woke up, Sonic rubbed his eyes. "Ok, either I'm blind or it's pitch black." He waved his hand slowly in front of his face but saw nothing. He slid back part of his left glove and opened the cam com.

It displayed a frown face for lack of signal.

"That's good to know." Sonic made it his new light. "Not the lack of signal, but, you know." The room he was sitting in seemed to be a three by three by three foot cube. He noticed a seam along the top as though it were the box's lid. He stood up and pushed up on the closest corner of the lid. Water gushed in, drenching him completely. "NOO!" Sonic dropped the lid back in place and shown the light on his quills. Almost blinding in bright color, they had returned to last night's shade of florescent orange. "I'll get you back for this, _Knuckles!_ I hope you like looking like a Christmas Tree!"

"Ah! Sonic! You're awake!"

Sonic looked around, then realized the noise was coming from the cam com. "Did you put this box in water on purpose?!"

"Yes, of course! After analyzing a sample of the chemical clinging to you, I knew it would be worth at least a dozen laughs. I almost wish I could have a full color recording of you turning from mud to traffic cone! But then, you probably would've been electrocuted."

Already soaking wet, Sonic sat in the now knee deep water. "And I'd like to see what color _you'd_ turn if you'd been dunked in that stuff!"

"So," Eggman's voice changed tone slightly. "Who was with you?"

"When? Where? I've had everybody around me before and I usually make it a point to travel the world at least once a year."

"Don't play games with me rodent. I know you are fast enough to have possibly escaped that trap no matter where you were standing, but my robots found you holding the door open. You obviously had someone with you, whom you helped to get away."

"There was a tiny brown bird in there looking for grub."

"Very funny."

"Thank you."

"Most unwelcome. Shall we get down to business?"

"I wasn't aware that we had any business going on between us, Egghead. Other than me trashing everything you build, of course."

"You won't be trashing anything this time. I have a job for you."

"Oh really?" Sonic laughed. "As if I'd do anything for you!"

"Oh I think you will. If you would look at the screen of your communication device."

Sonic brought his wrist up so he could see it. Eggman's face changed to a picture of three children, Patty, Jack, and Frankie. He stood up, bumping his head. He rubbed the top of his head. "You kidnapped them!?"

"Sonic!" Frankie pointed from behind the screen. "You be orange!"

Jack tapped Patty on the back and pointed to him. "I think your cash just crashed."

"Oh shut up!" Patty faced the camera. "It looks like we're all in a lot of trouble."

"Indeed," Sonic responded. "Especially Eggman!"

"You ain't gotta do a thing he says!" Frankie shouted. "We can handle blowin' this joint!"

"Ok that's enough!" Eggman's face reappeared.

"That's a dirty trick, Egghead!"

"You're just too clean to understand." Eggman smiled. "I need you to get something for me, Sonic. If you don't, confidant as they are, your little friends will never see the light of day EVER again. Think about how young they are, they have their whole lives ahead of them..."

"What, are you so lazy you can't get it yourself?" Sonic scoffed. "What do you need _me_ for?"

"Because I _have_ looked for it, searched for it for years! And _I_ know no one who'd be more willing to help me find it."

"But I do?"

"Yes. Sonic, have you ever heard of, the Red Ring?"

He snorted. "Sure I have! I hate to break it to you, Eggman, but the Red Ring was just a plot element in cartoon. It doesn't exist."

"I am certain that it does! And if you don't bring it to me, your little friends will suffer!"

"Ok! Fine! So you want me to get you an imaginary object."

"Your plane, what was it called? The Tornado is proof that it exists."

Sonic raised an eyebrow. "Really?" He sighed with boredom.

"Have you ever wondered why that little biplane of yours can get torn apart by the propeller blades, yet all you have to do to fix it is put it back together like a jigsaw?"

"Not really."

"Well, that is because of the lasting effects of contact with the Red Ring. I want you to find it, and bring it to me!"

"Yeah, um." Sonic scratched the back of his head. "You didn't happen to be listening in on that movie the gang and I watched the other night, did you?"

"Indeed I did!"

"Then you realize that it was only a cartoon?"

"I am aware that you didn't watch much TV when you were younger, Sonic. So I wouldn't expect you to believe that many of those adventures actually were based on real adventures Dune and Ariel had, before..."

"You're right, I don't believe it," Sonic cut him off.

"Oh! Just listen, you annoying little hedgehog! You are going to find that Red Ring or you will NEVER find these children!"

"There's one small problem with your reasoning, Egghead. In case you didn't actually watch it, the cartoon version of the Red Ring almost killed the cartoon version of Dune, just by being near him."

"And it would certainly kill you if you got within a hundred feet of it. Which is why I'm gave you those bracelets."

"What bracelets?" Sonic shown the light from the cam com on his right wrist. A shimmering, shiny blue band wrapped around his wrist like a cuff. "What are these?" He felt for and found the other one, just thin and narrow enough that he hadn't felt it when he opened the cam com. Sonic looked back into the tiny light.

"Allow me to explain why before the what. In my research of available evidence, I now have a theory about the Red Ring. Pure anti-Chaos. Order. Calmness. Predictability. All of these wound up in the form like that of your power rings, Sonic. I know you found all those red colored star rings in my interstellar amusement park, but this is not one of those. This ring looks just like a power ring, except it is red. It is the essence of pure anti-Chaos, and would eventually tear apart any living thing on Mobius if it was in their position too long. Why? Because everyone has it. Everyone on this planet has some degree of Chaos Energy, no matter how small. We need it to survive. Obviously, there are individuals like yourself who poses a much greater amount of Chaos Energy. You, Rodent, probably have it clinging to your shoe buckles. If you touched the Red Ring, it would probably kill you instantly. That's why I gave you those Order Bracelets. They keep all your Chaos Energy in check so you can safely handle the Red Ring, as long as you don't take them off."

"So basically, you gave me supped up versions of Shadow's inhibitor rings?"

"Yes, I suppose so. But I did take the initiative, and I feel like I should warn you."

"If I take them off, something explodes?"

"If you take them off… Yes, something explodes." Eggman's face frowned with the astonishment of one who's just been jinxed. "THEY explode!"

"Guess I'd better not take them off."

"And when you bring me the Ring, I'll deactivate the explosives."

Sonic scratched his head. "So, when are you going to let me out of this water logged box?"

"As soon as you asked."

The top opened and a bright light shone in. Sonic covered his eyes and stood up as the water all around started to drain. He had been in the bottom of a four foot deep public pool. Eggman's pod hovered above.

Eggman pushed the button that retracted his microphone. "Here, you'll want this." He tossed down a tough looking backpack.

Sonic caught the backpack, immediately noticing the effects of the Order Bracelets as it slipped from his grip and dipped in the water. "What's this?"

"All your stuff. When I activated the Order Bracelets, a whole bunch of things appeared around you. I never thought of you as the pack-horse type, Sonic."

It only had a single zipper on top for maximum storage. Sonic unzipped the bag.

"That's quite the collection you have going. No Chaos Emerald this time, but _a snow board_?"

Sonic pulled out the snow board. "You don't get out much, do you?" _How did he fit my snow board into a back pack?_

"No, but I figure you could walk faster than a snow board."

"Then you've never been in six feet of snow." Sonic replaced it in the bag. "What's this thing made out of? Like, _everything_ is in there!"

"Sorry, trade secret. Now get out of here and BRING ME THAT RED RING!"

"Touchy touchy!" Sonic climbed out of the pool.


	7. Chapter 6 Old Friend

Old Friend

Sonic ran up the street, almost embarrassed for moving so SLOW on top of having been forced to drag this stupid backpack around. _At least no one is looking for an orange super speed hedgehog. Thanks, Knucks._ Frustrated, he sat down on a bench outside a park to rest. He made a fist and inspected the contraption riding on his wrist. _How does Eggman expect me to get him _anything_ without my super-speed? The nerve! Even to think of such a thing!_ He wondered if such a small bracelet could really hold enough explosive to actually hurt him. He was about to take one off and see, but then noticed a mother and her two children walking by. The little boy smiled and waved. _Eggman can make some pretty big things fit into small packages._ He leaned back, suddenly remembering the backpack he was wearing. _It would probably be better not to risk it with so many people around. _

Sonic sighed and pulled back his cuff to give Tails a call. But as he pulled back the cuff of his glove, something scratched. Sonic took off the cam com. He removed the back and discovered most of the innards had been ripped out and replaced, effectively limiting the cam com's signal range to Eggman only. Sonic immediately smashed the thing and tossed it into the trash can next to the bench. _Stupid! One hundred percent, pure, complete and utter stupidity! How do normal folks do anything or get anywhere in any reasonable amount of time?_

An old man walked up into a public phone booth and inserted several coins. He talked with the phone for a while and hung up.

Sonic opened the strange bag and removed a ring. "Excuse me sir."

The old man turned around.

"I need some change."

* * *

Tails picked up the phone and looked at it. _No number, better not introduce myself_. "Hello?"

"Hi little buddy!"

"SONIC!"

"Ouch."

Tails jumped up and down and bounced onto the couch. "Where are you? What happened to you after the shack? Amy's been bugging me every ten minutes about you! And that new kid with her, Alwen? She's complaining that he won't leave her alone!"

"I take it she gave you the scoop?"

"Yeah! We're all dying to know what happened to you!"

"It's a little complicated, but I think I've it figured out. Eggman put some kind of fancy inhibitor rings on my hands, blocking my super speed."

"That's not good. Tell me where you are and I'll pick you up in the Hurricane." Tails stood up and made his way to the airplane garage.

"You know, I'm not quite sure... Wait, I see a land mark. I'll be in Golden Park in Frisco City. I can see the Ruby Red Bridge from here."

Tails stopped half way up the boarding ladder for the Hurricane. "He dragged you _all_ the from York to Cali?"

"Apparently."

"At least there's a ton of long and straight streets in that area." Tails sat down and closed the windshield bubble. "I'll be there in about half an hour."

* * *

Alone with the (enemy) guest, Amy sat outside, enjoying the sunshine from the roof of Tails's house while rubbing out some of the remaining flakes of Crazy Dye. Below, having tired of scratching his head in bewilderment and also one too many vain attempts to jump, climb, levitate, fly, or swim up to where he could be near her, Alwen sat in the dewy grass several feet below her swinging feet.

"Amy?" Alwen twirled a wild daisy between his fingers.

"What?" she responded, agitated.

"Why do you still chase after Sonic? You know he doesn't feel the same way about you."

Amy kicked the wall and leaned over the edge a bit. "For the same reason I'm going to ship you back to Aunt Vickie's farm if it's the last thing I do!"

Alwen frowned. "But he's never around. Why do you want him when you could have me? Here, now, all the time…"

She laughed. "The question is _not_ why I'd want Sonic when I could have you. The real question is why I'd want _you_ when I _do_ have him!"

Alwen sighed. "But…"

"No buts!" Amy waved for her hammer and pointed it down towards him. "Any more funny business mister and I promise you'll regret the day your parents first showed you which number was the news channel!" She turned her head at the sound of an engine. Effortlessly she pushed and slid off the roof.

They ran over the the runway and watched as the Hurricane landed on its magnetic airstrip. A very orange Sonic climbed out of the passenger cockpit.

"I was so worried about you!" Amy jumped at Sonic with her arms open to give him a big hug. "What happened? I thought Knuckles's dye was wearing off."

Sonic took a step back. "Yeah, well, Eggman reactivated it. On purpose! What do you say we go to Angel Island right now and tell Knucks how much fun that party was?"

Amy flicked her eyes to the side. "I was hoping we could go back to Aunt Vickie's farm. You know, let her know that the little… I mean, _Alwen_ is all right."

Alwen put his hand on her shoulder. "But I want to stay here with you! I can go back when school starts!"

"Your school starts in just a couple of days!" Amy not so gently pushed him to arms distance.

"As things stand," Tails clicked a remote to send the Hurricane to bed. "He couldn't go back if he wanted to."

"Huh?" Amy turned on Tails. "Who's side are you on anyway?!"

"Sonic told me that Dr. Eggman kidnapped the others from Aunt Vickie's, except for the lady herself," Tails explained.

"That's terrible!" Alwen put his hands over his ears. "I'm glad _I_ wasn't there."

Sonic threw down the conspicuous backpack. He knelt, opened it, and pulled out the old video from the night before. "As for an exchange..." He handed the movie to Amy.

Amy looked at the flap covering the exposed film. "The Red Ring? Sonic! This movie gave me a horrible nightmare! You died in it!"

Sonic nodded. "Guess what Egghead wants me to do."

She paled. "Oh, no..."

"What?" Alwen frowned. "I feel like I missed something important."

Tails took the movie and pulled Alwen inside. "Here, watch this, and it'll explain everything."

"Uh, ok." Alwen sat down in the middle of the couch.

He slipped the tape into one of about fifteen machines under the television. "When it's done, just call me." Tails handed him a remote.

"I'll do that!" Alwen nodded and took it.

Tails ran back outside. "Ok, I have him distracted. What's your plan, Sonic?"

"I'm going wherever he goes!" Amy swung her hammer around. "And not even the Red Ring can stop me!"

Sonic shook his head. "_I_ have to pay a visit to someone who'll know more about what _I'm_ looking for. Personally, I'm not convinced that the Red Ring even exists. I'll need the Tornado, and no Amy, you can't come. I'm pretty sure that no one else knows them except me."

Tails blinked and stared. "Wha… The Tornado is already to go, despite you having torn it to shreds this morning."

"Thanks, little buddy." Sonic saluted. "I hope the damage wasn't too bad."

"Nada, it was easy." Tails disappeared into the workshop.

"Sonic, wait!" Amy grabbed his arm. "What did you mean when you said you didn't think anyone else knew him? How do you know?"

"I said what I meant." Sonic climbed into the pilot's pit as the platform lifted the airplane and Tails out of the ground. "See you all sometime after dark."

The Tornado's engine roared to life, carrying Sonic faster and faster away until the wing flaps dipped and the shiny red biplane took off and turned out of view.

Tails shaded his eyes. "Man! I would even give my whole garage to know where he was going."

"Why didn't you put a GPS or something on it?" Amy turned to go home.

He shook his head. "I've got to get changing our frequencies."

* * *

Once upon a time in the dense jungles right outside the distorted area which signaled the entrance to a zone, there lived a secluded old seal who held many years before her modern wisdom. A hermit by nature, she had built for herself the dwelling which few living today would've been able to find if they knew this woman still existed. If they _had_ known, then many might have devoted a portion of their lives to locating her. But the seal had long since found she loved privacy more than she had once loved the fame of more youthful days. As things stood, she had only revealed herself to one other soul on the face of Mobius, the only one she found capable of knowing her past identity but having the wisdom and respect to keep her faked death a secret. Her name was Aerial, designer, builder, and original pilot and owner of the Falcon Wing.

_Knock! Knock! Knock! Knock! Knock! Knock!_

Aerial twisted off the water to the sink and dried her hands on a towel sitting on the counter. She peered out the window where a spherical mirrored marble sat on a garden ornament, providing a secret view of the knocker. She smiled. _My! How he's grown!_ Immediately she turned and hurried to the door and flung it open. "Look at you! All grown up and turning yourself pretty colors!"

Sonic frowned and turned aside. "That's Knucks's fault."

"Who?" she asked.

Stunned, Sonic suddenly remembered how he had never seen Aerial and a TV together in the same room. "A... _friend,_ of mine dunked a few of us in Crazy Dye."

She shook her head and stepped to the side. "You look good in orange, Sonic. Come on in."

Sonic entered the quaint living room. "This place seems smaller somehow."

"How has it been? With you and our mutual friend?" Aerial padded into the kitchen and poured two mugs of tea. "You obviously didn't come here for no reason." She held out one of the mugs.

Sonic took his tea by the handle. "Dr. Robotnik calls himself Eggman these days, and despite the change of his trademark, his inventions are never too hard to foil." He politely took a sip. "But now he's got a new one. Eggman... Robotnik wants the Red Ring, but he isn't threatening the world with any doomsday-device or world-will-be-mine-machine this time. He's kidnapped a few children, and if he doesn't get what he's after…"

Aerial nodded and lifted her hand. "I don't know about any red ring, unless you are talking about a certain old cartoon."

He nodded.

"Say no more," she closed her eyes and stood up. "It doesn't exist."

"I told him that."

"I always knew he was an idiot. Hmmm…" She stared up at the ceiling for a while. "I don't know what to tell you, Son." She paused. "What's keeping you from looking for those kids?"

Sonic set the mug down on a coffee table and held his wrists forward. "Egghead gave me these as presents. He says that since the Red Ring works on Anti-Chaos, it would kill me."

"That it would. Go on."

"These bracelets inhibit all my Chaos Powers, and have reduced my super speed to an almost stand still! He's made it so I can't even hold something in Hammerspace!"

"How embarrassing..." Aerial tutted to herself, shaking her head. "You haven't taken them off yet."

"Yeah, he said there was a _surprise_ inside if I tried anything funny."

"So that leaves you only a couple options." She held up her first finger. "One, free the hostages."

Sonic picked up his tea. "Tails should already be working on that."

She held up her next finger. "Two, get yourself a Red Ring, then give it to him."

He thought for a moment, then smirked. "I knew I'd come to the right place."

* * *

Patty began to walk around the white ceramic walls, scrutinizing them again as if in search of something which hadn't been there the first twenty go rounds.

Jack sat a little ways away from one corner, twiddling his thumbs.

Frankie lay on her back in the middle of the floor, staring at the camera and microphone not quite hidden in the dim ceiling corner. She finally sat up and watched Patty's monotonous motions around the prison box a couple times. "Whatever it is you're doing, if you ain't found it yet then you'll probably ain't never find it."

Patty reached traced her delicate finger along a seem in the stone masonry, brushing back her black hair to see the line better.

Frankie huffed and flattened her ears. "I ain't talkin' at a stone wall! Ain't I?! I said...!"

Jack sighed and leaned back on his arms. "Shutter Bug ain't heard a thing."

Frankie blinked at her twin brother. "Huh? Ain't I say what I said loud and clear?"

"You did." He stretched forward and flattened out on his stomach. "But Pat Pat don't hear the loud and clear. I had it done in my head back at Auntie Vickie's. Thought it'd be obvious to you." His left wing stretched a little more.

"Ya mean Shutterbug be deaf?" Frankie looked at the gecko girl again. "Than come how she talks?!"

Jack shrugged. "Keep your peepers on this." He wrapped his knuckles on the white stone floor.

Patty grumbled and stopped. "I'm _trying_ to concentrate!" She looked over her shoulder. "What is it, Jack-in-the-Box?!

"Sis got question for you." He pointed a thumb towards Frankie.

Frankie pointed to the wall. "What are you doing?"

Patty glanced up at the camera in the corner. "I'm looking for the dumbwaiter's door."

Once pointed out, Frankie's ears perked at the almost mechanical rhythm of Patty's voice. The way she spoke, held her gaze, moved her face, all as if she'd learned how to communicate from a vintage computer.

Frankie shook her head at the response to the question, trying her best not to focus or giggle at the older girl's now funny sounding voice. "You be searching about for the door of a patient person who can't talk?"

"No," Patty shook her head and stood next to them. "Aren't you hungry? We've been in here for hours and Dr. Eggman hasn't even given us so much as a crumb to split. I'm looking for the door so I'll know where the food comes out of when it does come."

Jack smiled and mouthed something to Patty, who nodded, glanced at Frankie, and mouthed back.

"What are you talking about?" Frankie looked from bat to lizard.

Jack held up his hand towards her, not taking his eyes off of Patty's mouth. The conversation continued for a minute, both parties making slight face expressions towards the end. Jack looked at Frankie. "Come to put thought about it, ain't you getting hungry too?" He started speaking rather loudly. "And do I think that we ought to ask him!"

Frankie raised an eyebrow. "What do you…"

Jack clucked his tong, then put a hand next to an ear.

"Ahh," Frankie nodded and grinned. "HEY DR. EGGMAN!" She started to hum.

"WE WANT SOME CHOW!" Jack jumped and flew up the the camera. "AND AIN'T THE CHAO WE GOT AT HOME AS PETS, YOU GOT TO GET US FOOOOOOOD!"

The camera's lens cracked and the microphone made popping noises. All the blinking lights on both electronic devices suddenly winked out. Jack settled back on the floor. "Super Sister! Slap me silly if you ain't sing like a splintering sip of spring wine!"

"Ok, that hurt," Patty shivered and hugged herself. "But I do admit, you have some talent. Good job." She patted Frankie on the head.

"I know where the door is." Frankie pointed up. "In the ceiling. Ain't anywhere else but straight up."

"You kick it open, Jack." Patty looked at him.

"I'll be done do my best!" Jack looked up at the center of the ceiling, crouched, and jumped. Flipping himself upside down with the help of his wings, he twisted in the air so that his right foot stabbed the center of a thin metal hatch. The door shriveled away from his shoe, leaving a two foot square opening. Jack disappeared up inside.

Patty clapped her hands. "You did it."

"Yippee! Look out above!" Frankie curled her fists and jumped from the floor into the hole. She her hands against the sides of the chute to keep from falling. "Jack?"

"I'll be all right," Jack called from the darkness above. "I ain't stop 'til I hit the top. That be all."

Frankie swung her feet up and slowly walked up the sides of the vertical tunnel.

"I gotcha!" he grabbed her arm as she ascended to the top of the shaft. They both turned their heads and watched to see how Patty would arrive.

Patty moved next to a wall, then proceeded to remove her shoes and socks.

Jack and Frankie looked at each other.

The gecko girl then, slipping her ever present digital camera around her wrist and holding the shoes with her tail, put first her hands then both feet on the stone wall.

"Wow!" Jack gasped. "How she goin' that?"

Hand over hand and foot over foot, Patty easily passed up out of view until her face appeared at the base of the dark shaft. She stared at their dimly lit masks of astonishment. "You guys must not have very many lizards where you live." She grabbed the inside of the shaft and pulled herself up to their level. She blinked a few times at the blackness ahead. "It's too dark to see, you guys. If either of you know the manual alphabet, take my hand and say so. If not, just write a big X."

"Ok mister smarty claws," Frankie felt around for Patty's hand. "Since you know so much about death people, ain't you know a bit of man-you-all alphabet?" She passed Patty's hand to Jack.

"Nope, sorry."

Frankie shrugged and drew an X on her palm.

"I was afraid of that." Patty took the lead. "I'll go first."

"Ain't you supposed to go first?" Jack asked his sister. "You're the one who's got the sonar."

Frankie pushed past the blind one. "Excuse me..."

"What is it?" Patty impatiently pushed forward.

"She'd tell ya, but I doubt you ain't got an ear to hear," Frankie explained.

"And don't mind me, I'm just following the leader." _Who ever that turns out to be,_ he thought to himself.

"Stop it!" Patty shoved Frankie behind her.

Frankie began to hum, vibrating the close walls to rattling the very bolts holding them together.

Patty paused. "Oh, that's right." She stopped and allowed Frankie to squeeze by.

They plodded on for a minute, Frankie offering updates to Jack on how far ahead the door was. As soon as they reached it, Francine hummed louder and saw a clear picture in her mind what it looked like. With Jack's help, they turned the wheel and the metal hatch swung open. The whole party tumbled out into freedom, but blinking rapidly in the sudden overpowering light.

_Cu-click!_

Frankie rolled into a shadow and squinted. "Oh ho."

"Big 'Oh ho' or a puny 'Oh ho'?" Jack rubbed his eyes.

"Neither." Frankie still squinted, but was opening her eyes a little wider. "And now I ain't figure our escape was as clean cheese as our bogus brains chalked it up to be."

Patty opened her eyes half way and took another picture.

Jack squinted. A handful of deadly looking robots with arm guns aimed at them point blank and a very tall Dr. Eggman standing behind them. "Uh, howdy?"

Eggman grinned. "Did you foolish children _really_ think you'd surprised me? Did you believe that I _wouldn't_ take action when the live video and audio feeds suddenly fell blank?"

"It wasn't my idea." Patty held up her hands and shook her head.

"No, but that still doesn't stop you from turning right around and going back in." Eggman pointed inside the dark hole they had come from. "These Zipper bots will escort you."

Three football sized robots quickly ran up to them from nowhere and wrapped claw like fingers around the children's arms. The three barely had time to protest before being rushed back down the hall and dropped down the chute.

Jack fell first, landing on his stomach. He glanced up and flapped his wings to get out of the way of Patty. She plopped down on her back, opened her eyes, and rolled to the side just as Frankie fell. Frankie landed hard in a sitting position, then a brown cloth bag fell in her lap.

"Owe." Frankie stood up, dumping the bag on the floor.

"Hey, what's that?" Patty opened the bag. "Bread, cheese, and three bottles of water." She looked up. One of the Zipper bots had come down and was repairing the camera and microphone. "At least the guy can take a hint."

"He ain't send us any fruit?" Jack shook the bag upside down. "Ain't that a rotten deal!"

"Patty." Frankie waved to get her attention. "What were you taking pictures of?"

She set down the cheese and brought her camera out of Hammerspace. "Let's have a look."

The latest picture taken appeared on the camera's two inch screen. It was a picture of robots, Eggman, and a background window with fish in it.


	8. Chapter 7 It's Not Easy

It's Not Easy

Late that evening, Sonic landed the Tornado on Tails's runway. He jumped out as the blade was still spinning and opened Eggman's backpack. "Tails!" he threw a ring in the air. "We need a Red Ring."

"Sonic?" Tails caught it. "The Red Ring doesn't exist."

"I know." Sonic smirked. "But Eggman wants a Red Ring and he's holding Aunt V's kids, except for Alwen, until we give him one. So we _make_ a Red Ring."

Tails froze for a moment. "Oh! You mean, make this ring red and trick Eggman into thinking it's the real deal?"

"Yep!" He nodded. "Any ideas?"

"Not really." Tails rubbed the golden roundness of the ring. "You can't paint a ring, nor could you make one out of something else and still have it have the magical properties you'd be looking for." He sighed. "Let me think on that."

They walked towards the workshop. Sonic looked up at the stars. "Have you found any trace of them?"

"Nothing." Tails handed Sonic a shiny new cam com. "But I did finish changing our frequencies." Tails opened the door.

"That's good to hear." Sonic tightened the wrist strap and pulled the cuff of his glove over it. As they entered the light, he happened to glance down at his shoes. "Why was it that my shoes turned green in the crazy dye buy yours didn't?"

"Shhh…" Tails pointed to the couch. "I finally got Alwen to go to sleep just before you came."

"Oops," Sonic whispered. "Sorry."

"It's okay, guys." Alwen turned over on the couch. "I wasn't really sleeping. Just contemplating why I got left behind… again!"

Sonic looked at him. "I wasn't aware that you were upset."

"I wasn't," He got up and walked closer. "Until I thought about all that's happened since I met you guys."

Sonic crossed his arms. Tails looked between them, confused.

Alwen continued. "For my entire life, I've been living alone with my parents in an underwater sea lab. Then one day I finally was granted the chance to come above. Not only that, but you gave me the chance to hang out with you guys. I have been watching you on my TV set for like, ever! And now when my chance comes, all you guys do is leave me behind. I thought it would be really cool to hang with you. You, Sonic, looked so cool on TV. I wanted to be just like you! But now that I'm here, I see that you are not what I thought you were. No, you left me behind on everything! And I will never want to be like you again!"

"Sonic?" Tails asked.

Sonic lifted his hand to Tails. "Alwen, there are reasons why I didn't take you with me today."

"Yeah! I'll bet!" Alwen sneered. "You just didn't want me around! I'm just a kid! I'll slow you down! You didn't want me because I'd take away from your little adventure! Well, I've_ never_ had _any_ adventure! You don't know what it's like to be alone! To have no friends! To be the lonely little nobody buried under the ocean! You don't know what it's like when no one cares about you! No one knows your name or who you are! No one thinks you matter because as far as they are concerned, you don't even exist! And then when I finally get my chance, I'm… No, YOU! You stepped on me! You brushed me aside! You sat me on a couch to watch some dumb thirty minute movie to distract me while you left me behind AGAIN! And I'M TIRED OF IT!"

There was stunned silence in the room for a whole minute. Alwen had locked eyes with Sonic, but Sonic didn't even blink. Tails felt like he'd been punched in the gut. He wanted to disappear and pretend this little spat had never happened.

Finally, Sonic said something. "What? You think it's easy being me?" Then he walked away into the hall.

Alwen glanced at Tails. "He did _not!_"

Tails nodded. "He just did."

"GET BACK HERE!" Alwen charged Sonic and made a fist.

Sonic spun around and caught Alwen's arms, then pinned him against the wall. "WHAT'S WRONG WITH YOU!? I COULD HAVE KNOCKED YOU HEAD OFF!"

"You owe me an explanation!" Alwen struggled but couldn't budge a millimeter.

"You want an explanation?" Sonic frowned. "Here's an explanation. Perhaps it's all my imagination, but Dr. Eggman is bent on world domination. Maybe it was just fireworks, but the Tornado's engine didn't just explode by itself while we were trying to evade proton missiles this morning. Maybe I've never been as strictly alone as you, but has anyone ever teased you? Has anyone _ever_ made fun of you or asked you to do tricks for their own amusement? You're weird. You're different. Therefore you don't belong. Get out of our lives. Then one day, Eggman brought one of his little curses to my home town and I saved the whole city. Suddenly I'm the only one standing between him and them. All of them. Now I'm a world hero, and everyone is depending on me to keep them safe. Let me tell you, there's nothing harder than fighting a domineering egoist AND keep everyone safe, AT THE SAME TIME! The world is thrust on _your _shoulders, Alwen. What would _you_ do?"

"I…" Alwen looked down.

There was a long pause. "That's what I thought." Sonic released Alwen's wrists and relaxed. "It's dangerous out there. I just don't want you to get hurt."

"I'm so… I didn't…" Alwen shrugged and slowly shuffled back to the couch.

Tails walked up behind Sonic. "No one ever teased you. Did they?"

"Nah, I was the cool kid. Everybody was always asking me to show off." Sonic shook his head. "It was my understanding that you were the one who got teased."

"I was, a lot." Tails scratched behind one ear. "Say, what was that you were saying about your shoes?"

"Hum? Oh. I was wondering why mine turned green but yours didn't when Knucks dunked us."

"You know, I'm not sure." Tails pulled Sonic into the lab. "Let's find out. Take off your shoes."

Sonic kicked off his shoes and put one of them on a table.

Tails scanned his oddly green shoe. "Sonic, what are your shoes made of?"

"I don't know. They were a gift."

"Who gave them to you?"

Sonic thought for a while. "I don't remember. It was someone I'd never seen before. He wasn't human. He was tall, kind of white, and had a strange looking haircut."

"Tall?" Tails stopped scanning and thought. "How old were you?"

"It was a little bit before we met. Few weeks? A month?" Sonic thought about the time he'd first met Tails.

"I remember that," Tails smiled. "But if you hadn't said 'tall'… We only know one white individual who isn't a human, is white, and has a funny haircut."

"Silver." Sonic rolled his eyes. "Why didn't _I_ think of that?"

"I'm not you, so I can't answer that one." Tails laughed and scanned a power ring. "Anyway, your shoes have similar scans to a power ring."

"Silver made my shoes out of power rings?"

"No, I don't think so." Tails scratched behind his ear again. "It's probably more as though they're made _with_ the power or a ring."

"Weird." Sonic put his shoes back on. "Never really thought about it, though. So, why the dye?"

He shook his head. "Still not sure. If Silver really did make your shoes, then it could be a million things. Not just ring energy. You never know about all this stuff from the future."

"Oh, thanks. The shoes I've had for years are suddenly form the future, and you're not sure about it."

"Well, when you put it _that_ way," Tails put his scanning equipment away and yawned. "I'm tired. How about you?"

Sonic smirked. "You ask silly questions sometimes, Tails."

"I should have known." Tails blinked. "You're never tired."

* * *

The next morning, Amy dipped the end of one lock of hair in pure water. When it didn't change color after a whole minute, she rejoiced. She squeezed her hair dry, picked up the phone, and dialed Cream's house.

"Hello?" Vanilla answered the phone.

"Hi, Miss Vanilla. It's Amy. I was wondering if I could come over for a while."

"Of course dear! You're always welcome here."

"Thank you! I'll be there in about ten minutes."

"Bye bye."

"Bye." Amy hung up the phone. "Anything to be sure that little twerp doesn't know where I am!" She slipped on her hair band and was out the door.

Cream and Cheese greeted her in sight of their house. "Hello Amy! Are we going to have a tea party?"

"Sure! Because this morning I woke up and there was no dye on me at all!" She spun around. "Now I can finally take a proper bath again!"

"That's really strange, Amy. When Mother and I got home, I took a bath right away and all the colors disappeared."

"Chao!" Cheese nodded, confirming her statement.

"That _is_ strange." Amy thought about it. "I dipped the very tip of my hair yesterday morning, and it turned green again. Yet you washed it all out two days ago?"

"Uh hum." Cream nodded. "And is it true that Mr. Sonic became bright orange again because Dr. Eggman poured water all over him?"

"Yes, that happened yesterday." Amy thought for a while. "I don't know, Cream. Maybe we should tell Tails about this."

"But what about our tea party?"

"Chao, chao."

Amy suddenly thought of Alwen. "You know what? Go ahead and serve the tea, but set the stump for four. I'm going to invite Tails to join us."

"Chao!" Cheese flew inside.

"Yeah!" Cream followed him.

Amy pinched open her cam com. "Tails? Would you join us at Cream's? We have something interesting to ask you about the crazy dye."

"Ok. I'll be there as soon as I can." Tails closed the communication.

Cream and Cheese set the table while Amy brought out the stools. Tails showed up a few minutes later, flying over the house.

Tails sat down. "Something interesting about crazy dye?"

"Chao! Chao!" Cheese shook his head and tipped the empty tea pot over Tails's cup.

"What? Am I supposed to take a sip before I start talking?" Tails glanced in his empty cup.

"Yes, of course." Cream held her cup for Cheese to pour into. "Otherwise how would we ever get you or Mr. Sonic or Mr. Knuckles to play it right?"

Tails pretended to drink something from the tiny cup. "Mmm… Good tea. How about this strange thing about the crazy dye?"

"For some reason… Thank you Cheese." Amy pretended to take a sip. "When Cream came home from the party and had a bath, all the dye in her fur washed out."

"But it didn't with the rest of us." Tails mused over this. He snapped his fingers. "And when Sonic got dunked again and changed color, so did his shoes! But not his gloves for some reason."

Cream glanced at Amy. "I don't think I understand what you were talking about, Tails."

But he was too lost in thought to respond. "Excuse me." Tails stood up.

"Chao! Chao! Chao!" Cheese shook his head and held up his extra small tea cup.

"You have to finish your tea!" Amy pointed to his cup.

Tails picked it up and held it upside down over his open mouth. "Thank you for the phantom tea, but I think I just figured something out." He put the cup down and flew off.

Cream sighed. "I wished he would have stayed for a bit longer."

"At least he was polite enough to tell us _when_ he was going to leave." Amy sipped her tea again.

* * *

"SONIC!" Tails called aloud when he landed in the yard.

"Up here little buddy!" Sonic waved to him from the lowest tree branch of a very tall tree.

"Me too!" Alwen smiled down from a couple branches above. "And boy! Am I having fun! I've never done this before! And it's awesome!"

Tails scaled the distance up they were. The lowest branch, the one Sonic was sitting on, was at least twenty feet up. He looked at Alwen. "How did you get up there? I thought you couldn't climb without a ladder."

Sonic stood up, "He had help," and jumped down. "So what cha got, little buddy?"

Tails told him about Cream, and how long the dye lasted on her compared to the rest of them.

Sonic crossed his arms. "I'm jealous."

"What?" Alwen was hanging upside down from the branch now. "You're already looking more blue than brown or orange, compared to yesterday."

"It's got to be our Chaos Energy concentrations!" Tails held up a power ring. "I also think it will work on the ring, you know, like it worked on your shoes because your shoes have similar energy signatures as a power ring."

"The dye will make a ring turn purple," Sonic glanced back up at Alwen.

Alwen took that as an invitation. "Then convince that Smarty Pants that the Red Ring was really purple."

"You know, that might actually work." Tails thought about it. "Not even Eggman has seen the Red Ring before. Why can't we say it was purple? I mean after all, why would we lie?"

"Because Egghead asked for a lie to begin with, that's why." Sonic smiled and gave Alwen a thumbs up. "Thanks for the really cool idea!"

Tails twirled the ring around his wrist. "So, does that mean we head out for Angel Island now, or tonight when it's actually closer?"

"Let's go now. I have a bone to pick with that Knuckle Head." Sonic thumped a fist into his other hand.

"We all fell in that stuff, not just you." Tails started walking towards the workshop.

"Hey! What about me?" Alwen still stood on the lowest branch, holding onto the trunk and staring at the ground. "How am I going to get down?"

"I'll get him." Tails flew up to the tree. "Just grab my hands."

"And you won't drop me?" Alwen offered one hand to Tails.

Sonic snickered. "And you've watched us on TV _how_ many times was it?"

"I won't drop you." Tails reached for Alwen's other hand. "I've flown with both Sonic and Knuckles before."

"I trust you." Alwen let himself be pulled from the tree and be set on the ground. "That was fun. Can we do it again?"

"Perhaps some other time." Sonic gestured towards the workshop. "Care to join us, _with_ an invitation this time?"

"Where are we going?" Alwen walked inside and down stares with them.

"Angel Island," Tails answered as he flicked on the light.

"Really?" Alwen's eyes widened. "Angel Island…"

Sonic clapped his hands. "I'll take that as a 'Yes, I've been dying to go for my entire life!' Or something similar."

"Of course!" Alwen looked at all the planes. "Which one do we take."

"Sonic's favorite." Tails lead them to the Hurricane. "It's the only one with three _real_ seats."


	9. Chapter 8 Best Served Cold

Best Served Cold

When Tails and Sonic designed and built the Hurricane from scratch, one of the first things they decided was the way to test and see if she would be 'fast enough'. When the ultimate speed plane was in good working order, the snow storms suddenly melted into rain and they had to wait almost a month for the first sunny day. On that day, Sonic raced Tails in the Hurricane to the southern tip of the Great Peninsula. It was a tie.

But it would still take several hours to reach Angel Island, so Alwen decided to call home. At first he had no signal, but then Tails attached an extra antenna to the phone so it now got signal from his satellite.

Alwen leaned back in a seat all his own, except that he shared a cockpit bubble with Sonic reading something ahead of him. The pilot's pit was a separate bubble. He dialed the number of ARF and listened to the buzzes for a bit.

"Atlantis Research Facility. How may I help you?"

"Mom?" Alwen sat forward. "It's me!"

"Alwen dear! How are you? Are you having fun at Aunt Vickie's farm?"

Sonic glanced back.

Alwen winked. "Yeah, it was fun while it lasted."

"While it lasted? What happened?"

Sonic snickered.

"Say, is Dad around?" Alwen leaned back in his seat again, crossing his legs.

"He's down in the Lab. We found something interesting that seems to hold the key. What happened up there?!"

"Well, fist guess where I am."

"You burned the barn down, didn't you?"

Alwen's jaw dropped, and ahead of him, Sonic held his hand over his mouth and trembled in fitful laughter. Alwen shook his head. "No, I mean yes. The barn did burn down."

"Oh, goodness! You weren't supposed to say that! Were you hurt? Where are you now?"

"No, I wasn't hurt at all. And neither were Sonic or Amy Rose."

She paused, suddenly unsure. "Are you telling me a story, Alwen?"

Alwen shook his head. "No, Mom. Sonic is right here in front of me. Would you like to talk to him?"

"I don't believe you, so sure. Let me talk to Sonic."

Alwen stretched forward and passed his phone to Sonic. "Here, I can just picture her rolling her eyes about now."

"You know, I think this is a first for me." Sonic studied the cell phone, then held it up to his ear. "Hello Alwen's Mom. It's me, Sonic the Hedgehog!"

"So, which one of Alwen's new friends are you?" she asked.

"I just told you."

"I'm sorry, but I really don't believe my son could possibly have met him."

"You know, that's the weird part about what we do. I don't usually get to talk with the parents of the people we meet. And with Egghead doing all he does, we never know _who_ we meet. Want me to explain how it happened?"

Slight pause. "Sure."

"First, Tails and I were on our way to Angel Island for this party Knuckles had planned for us. In the morning, the Knucks man said he saw a fire on the horizon. Tails was still a little tired, so me and Amy hopped in the Tornado and zoomed down there to Aunt Vickie's farm. Amy jumped out of the plain and pulled Alwen and a girl out of the barn before it exploded while I landed the plane."

"So Sonic the Hedgehog is a firefighter now?"

Alwen leaned forward into Sonic's other ear and whispered, "she's trying to pull your wit, don't let her."

He held up an OK sign. "Nah, we left that to the bright red truck that pulled up five minutes later. Right now, we're on our way back to Angel Island."

"_Right,_" she said slowly and sarcastically.

Alwen reached for the phone.

Sonic handed it back.

"Mom?" Alwen held it close. "Check for my phone on the GPS. We should be traveling at about… Sonic? How fast did you say this thing was?"

"Eight hundred miles per hour ground speed, give or take a few mph depending on which way the wind is blowing."

"About eight hundred MPH, except in the air and heading for Angel Island," Alwen relayed to his mom.

She laughed. "Honey, not even a jumbo jet can fly… that… fast?"

Alwen smiled. "Did you just check it up on the computer?"

"Yes, and I almost believe you now."

"Mom, have I ever lied before?"

"No, but you _have_ told me stories."

"Well, this isn't one of them."

"In fact," Sonic looked out the window. "We could be going right over your house."

Alwen turned his head and peered out over the wing. He saw the east coast retreat into the window frame and the ocean steadily deepen in color. "Did you hear that, Mom?"

"I can see it, Alwen. If ARF weren't so deep, I'd be waving to you."

He laughed. "And I'd wave back. Oral wave!"

"Oral hug!"

"Oral hug back!"

* * *

Angel Island had always been a Chaos Energy hot spot. Although there was nothing wrong with living on a hot spot, it did mean Knuckles got some pretty interesting weather sometimes. Some places always felt like summer, like in and around the volcano. Other zones like Ice Cap stayed snowy all year round. Almost everywhere else that wasn't underwater, tended to transfer seasons about a month before the rest of seasonal Mobius did.

Today, Knuckles was kicking slightly frosty leaves off the Shrine of the Master Emerald. And every time he kicked, he was reminded of that awful stunt Sonic pulled on him.

"Just a couple days, the package said!" He brushed a small layer of brown foliage off the top of the Emerald. "Then why hasn't it…" Knuckles paused at the sound of something big and fast crashing along the runway. "Well what do you know? They've come back for more!"

Knuckles walked towards the only area flat and long enough for the Hurricane to land. He saw them just as Sonic and Tails were jumping out of the airplane. "What's the matter guys? Did you come back for more or do you need my help with something?"

"Both." Sonic still seemed a shade brown. He turned around a helped a strange kid out of the back seat.

"Say, who's the pup?" Knuckles took another step forward.

"Alwen," the little kid stepped forward and shook his hand. "I'm from the ocean."

Knuckles raised an eyebrow. "The ocean?"

"Uh hum." Alwen nodded. "My parents are marine biologists with doctorates in foreign linguistics and psychology."

"Um." Knuckles glanced at Sonic and Tails, then back to the strange little hedgehog. "Could I please have that last part in English?"

"His folks are trying to find a way to communicate with dolphins and whales and the like." Tails closed the bubble hatches after Sonic got his bag.

Alwen opened his mouth and turned around. "I didn't know you studied Latin!"

Tails patted the side of the plane. "Yeah, I'm told I get a little geeky at times."

Sonic leaned against the sleek Hurricane, smirking. "You're looking a little green, Knucks."

Knuckles looked down. "Yeah, no thanks to you." He crossed his arms and smiled. "But it seems you haven't been able to shake it off either."

"Actually," Sonic took a step towards the dark green echidna. "I was almost blue again about this time yesterday, until Egghead decided I was in need of a serious dunking."

Knuckles laughed and clapped his hands. "I just bet you were mad at him for that!"

"Not really."

"You weren't?"

"No." Sonic dropped the back pack and held up two fists. "I thought of you."

Knuckles's eyes widened and he darted to the side. "What? You're not going to chase me?"

Sonic shook his head. "There'll be plenty of time for that later. But for now, take a closer look."

Knuckles cautiously came closer. "Wait, what are those things on your hands? Don't tell me you're wearing _bracelets._"

"Complements of Dr. Eggman, think of them as fancy inhibitor rings. Except there's a bomb inside if I take them off."

"I've never known you to hide from some old bomb, Sonic." Knuckles smirked.

"Oh yeah? Well I'd like to know what _you_ would do if you knew a ring couldn't protect you." He nodded after a moment's silence. "Yeah, that's what I thought." Sonic kicked the bag. The top flap fell open. "At least the guy did a good job, managing to create something that could fit my snowboard into something that looked like a normal backpack."

"Those bracelets also took away your hammerspace?!" Knuckles took a step back. "I'm glad I'm not in Eggman's way everyday."

"Just you wait until I get my hands on Egghead." Sonic picked a ring out of the bag and tossed it.

Tails caught the ring. "Knuckles, do you remember that movie we watched?"

"Yeah, what about it?"

"Eggman wants the Red Ring in exchange for a few hostages." Tails walked forward.

"And he's kidnapped all the rest of my new friends at Aunt Vickie's farm!" Alwen crossed his arms and nodded.

"But the Red Ring doesn't exist." Knuckles shook his head. "How are you supposed to give him a Red Ring?"

Tails put the ring in Knuckle's hands.

"Hey Knucklehead, try and guess why we need your help." Sonic pointed to the object in his hands.

Knuckles looked at the ring. "What? You'll never convince him that an ordinary ring is anything special."

"Unless we change its color." Alwen smirked. He pointed to Sonic and then Tails. "They called it crazy dye?"

"Um, are you sure this is going to work?" Knuckles pointed to one of his white gloves. "The dye doesn't stick to objects, just people."

"Except my shoes." Sonic pointed down. "See? Still slightly green. And no, those aren't grass stains."

"I found out that Sonic's shoes have some of the same energies as a power ring," Tails explained. "Like a ring without the ring."

"That's an odd thought." Knuckles studied the ring again. "But I suppose it's worth a try. Come on, everybody. I uncovered that pond right after you left, but I don't think it's evaporated too much."

"Cool!" Alwen walked right behind Knuckles. "Cuz I want to see what _I_ look like in crazy colors."

"Yeah, wait until you tell your folks all about your vacation." Sonic followed behind with Tails at his side.

"I can't imagine it'll be any worse than what Frankie's mom did to us." Tails snickered.

"Huh?" Alwen slowed and waited for them.

"Two days after the M fiasco," Tails explained, "Jack calls us up and recites the speech she gave them. He said she almost had a heart attack when she discovered Frankie missing. And then to see her on the news that evening? With_ us_?"

Alwen laughed. "Yeah, I remember that. They even interviewed Mrs. Nightflyer the next morning, asking her how she felt when her daughter was hanging with you guys. She almost fainted on camera! I think that's when I first realized that even 'normal' people could have really awesome adventures. Then I wanted to do that too, to meet you guys someday."

"Well, you never know." Knuckles pulled back a branch and stepped back. "Here we are."

"Where?" Alwen pushed through some bushes.

"Wait, stop!" Sonic reached ahead to catch him.

_SPLASH!_

Alwen's head popped up out of the murky liquid. "What? I thought… it was like the ground kept going!"

"It certainly looks different in the day, doesn't it?" Tails looked around.

The pond was still two feet deep, but now uncovered as Knuckles had explained. You could see everything from where Knuckles had dug out the now empty slide for the quicksand chute, all the way along the alleged underground river, then over a small cliff, and now the open pond of dirty water.

Sonic looked over the course. "Say Knucks, was there ever a way to avoid that trap?"

"What's this? Hey guys!"

Knuckles nodded. "I never said you had to_ return_ with your glow sticks. You could have left the ones with your names on top of that statue, instead of smashing it down with both hands."

"GUYS!" Alwen shouted. He stood up, still perfectly sky blue. "I thought you said this would turn me crazy colors!"

Finally noticing him, Knuckles looked up and put his thumb on his chin "That _is_ odd. The package said it was _guaranteed_ to change fur color."

Sonic dipped a finger in the strange water, watching the tip turn black. "The dye still works."

"What a disappointment!" Alwen splashed to shore.

Sonic and Knuckles both jumped back as he climbed out.

"Well, might as well do what we came here for. Care to do the honors, Knucks?" Sonic motioned to the power ring in his hands.

"Oh, right." Knuckles dipped the ring in the dye. It turned purple as he turned it. "All done."

"Not quite." Sonic took a step back and leaned forward with his arm out.

_SPLASH!_

"Sonic!" Tails flew over Knuckles in the pond. "I'll help you, Knuckles."

"But look!" Alwen pointed.

"Say!" Knuckles studied his arms. "That wasn't half bad, Sonic. I'm red again!"

"Interesting..." Tails pinched his chin.

Alwen climbed out of the pond. "Come to think of it, I've never gone swimming without a wet suit and air tank."

Tails dipped low and grabbed the floating purple ring.

"Now to call up Eggman." Knuckles made a fist.

"That's the spirit!" Sonic formed a fist and they put their fists together. Sonic pulled back the cuff of his left glove and pinched the cam com open and coded for Eggman's general signal.

"Let's just _ring_ up Eggman and tell him we have it." Tails dried off the purple ring and put it in Sonic's pack.

"Oh, Eggman!" Sonic said into the cam com.

Nothing happened.

He flicked it. "What's wrong with this thing?"

"I think I know." Tails gave him a small microchip. "Here's his bug."

Sonic handed him his cam com. "You do it."

Tails opened the back and inserted the chip. Then he snapped the cover back on and gave the whole thing back to Sonic.

"Hey Eggman!"

Eggman's face appeared. "Have you found it yet, hedgehog?"

"Yeah, I found your ugly mug. That's what I found." Sonic nodded.

"Very goo… Err, DID YOU FIND THE RED RING!"

Alwen laughed.

"Yes, I found the Red Ring. You don't have to yell." Sonic winked at them all in a way that Eggman wouldn't see. "Only, it's not red, it's purple."

"Whatever! Just get here as soon as possible!"

"Um, about that," Sonic made a big show of scratching his head. "I don't know where your 'here' is."

"I'll send something to go get you." Eggman looked down and his right arm moved. He leaned forward. "You found the Red Ring on Angel Island?"

Tails glanced up, all laughter suddenly gone.

"Yep. Right under our noses all this time." Sonic nodded.

"No matter." Eggman seemed to have pushed some more buttons. "My robot will still be able to get you. And don't you dare bring any of your friends along. Trust me, they won't be able to help much anyway."

"One last thing, Doc." Sonic tilted his head up an inch. "I want to talk to the others again."

* * *

"Even if'en I ain't never say anything about Eggman again," Jack tilted his face down and pointed up his mouth. "He sure ain't got no knack for making cheese sandwiches!"

"DON'T remind me!" Patty puffed through her mouth, holding her stomach

"Ain't you got nothing better to complain about Jack?" Frankie frowned at her brother.

"I ain't got nothing but everything to complain about!" Jack stood up and glared at the camera. "And you ain't no service neither! We ain't got nothing to do for the last two and a half stinkin' days! And you ain't got nothing for us to eat but some crummy bread and moldy cheese! Yawl don't never say 'hello' nor even 'shut up' neither! Ain't a single one of us down here who ain't got no bone to pick with you now!"

Something popped out of the side of the camera.

"Didn't it do that once before?" Patty turned around and looked at the wall opposite the camera. "When it projected…"

Sonic's face, familiarly blue again, appeared on the wall. "You guys alright?"

"We ain't one bit alright!" Jack stomped his foot and shook his fists.

"Jack! You have got to calm down!" Patty slid her camera from around her wrist in to his hand and whispered in his ear, "Now's our chance, fly up to it and show him the picture."

Jack grumbled and took the camera.

"I figure I ain't in the wrong when I tell ya we all desperate to be rescued!" Frankie put on her best desperate face.

Jack turned the camera on and pushed the play back button. He flew up to the camera and filled the lens with the screen.

Sonic's eyes twitched around for a second, then he opened his mouth to speak. But it wasn't Sonic's voice the children heard. The Sonic on the wall instantly replaced itself with an image of Eggman. "Did you children _really_ think I didn't have live feeds of both ends of your conversation?"

Jack dropped down from the camera. "Ain't you got nothing better to do than eavesdrop or interrupt?"

"I don't know what _your_ humble brain is capable of, but _mine_ knows it is better to sacrifice manners for the greater good of evil purposes, than to let good plans go to bad waste. Sonic will never figure out where I've hidden you!"

* * *

Tails closed Sonic's cam com. "They're in the reefs around Howihi Island. Those kinds of fish don't live anywhere else."


	10. Chapter 9 Swimming With The Fishies

Swimming with the Fishies

"Something in one of the gifts Eggman gave you had a tracking device in it." Tails had emptied the back pack and was feeling the material.

"Does that mean that Eggman knew all along where Sonic was?" Alwen asked.

"I wouldn't think so." Sonic imitated the look on Eggman's face. "He sounded surprised to see I was on Angel Island, like he didn't know where I was before he hit the switch."

"He could've been trying to trick you," Knuckles suggested.

"Maybe, but I doubt it." Tails used a knife to rip a tiny hole in the inside of the backpack. "I think I found it! Here," he held out a microchip the size of pin head.

"That's it?" Knuckles asked.

"That's it." Alwen nodded. "You should see the guts of some of the stuff my parents work with!"

"Yuck!" Sonic put a hand over his nose. "I hope you're not talking about fish guts."

"No, I meant the computers!" Alwen stared up at Sonic. "What made you come up with that idea?"

"That is an example of what I like to call, a 'Sonic moment'." Tails turned the chip over. "You see this micro antenna?"

"Not really," Knuckles spoke the group.

"It only receives signal. And when it does, this part self-destructs, causing this thing to send out a 'help me' signal. Very basic stuff, really." Tails's finger moved ever so slightly with every part he described.

"While this is all nice and mildly entertaining," Sonic folded his hands. "What's the plan?"

"I think you should go with Eggman," Tails looked at Sonic. "And the rest of us will follow."

"Follow_ how_?" Knuckles shrugged. "We'll have to get in there in by a way that he won't see coming."

Alwen had a finger on his lip. "Little Fish."

"Huh?" they all looked at him.

"Aunt Vickie called me Little Fish." Alwen looked up. "Jack sent us a picture of a reef, right? If we go in swimming without any electronic devices at all, he'll think we're just a few big fish on his radar."

"You're not half bad, Alwen." Knuckles patted his shoulder. "Good idea."

"Eggman had better have a submarine built into that thing," Sonic pointed skywards.

Tails dropped the tracker back into the recesses of the back pack. "You'd better take that with you."

Sonic took the now mostly empty bag. "Whatever you do, make sure you've got travel arrangements for three extra passengers."

The lumbering transport capsule landed several yards away.

"What a piece of junk!" Tails frowned at it. "Look, not one single shield or weapon!"

"Looks like Eggman's mocking you." Knuckles chuckled at Sonic.

"Not for much longer." Sonic knocked on the side of the large round robot. "Hey bulbous bot, open up!"

A door opened. There was a chair inside and not much else.

Sonic turned around and waved. "See you on the flip side, guys!" He stepped onboard.

The door slammed shut and the robot took off.

"We'd best be off too now." Tails started walking towards where they'd landed the Hurricane. "Care to join the fun Knuckles?"

"My pleasure!"

* * *

Amy and Cream sat on the lawn with a small picture book between them. Cheese silently hovered over them.

Cream looked at the words. "'See the bright red apple? Don't you think your teacher would love to see that apple on her desk?' Amy, I don't like this book."

"What's wrong Cream? Too hard?" Amy frowned.

"It's too easy! I know all these words already."

Amy picked up the book and looked at the paper back cover. "It says second grade on it. Most kids your age don't even know the alphabet. You're going to be ahead of everyone by two years!"

"Chao! Chao! Chao!" Cheese pointed skyward.

They looked up and saw the Hurricane coming in for landing.

Amy jumped to her feet. "Let's go see what's going on. You're tired of reading anyway."

"Mama said I had to read at least one book this afternoon."

"Oh…" Amy looked longingly towards the sleek speed plain.

Cream smiled. "But I can read by myself. You go ahead Amy. I'll catch up with you later."

"You're the best, Cream!" Amy gave her a big hug.

"Chao chao!"

"And you too Cheese." Amy waved goodbye as she ran off.

Cream hurried to finish the boring book.

* * *

"Hi guys! What's…" Amy paused when she saw Alwen but no Sonic. "Where's Sonic?"

Knuckles related everything that happened on Angel Island. "You can't come."

"What do you mean I _can't_ come?!" Amy drew her hammer. "Surely you don't think it'll be too dangerous for a_ girl!_"

"No," Knuckles put his hands out. "There won't be enough seats for everyone if you do come."

"Explain," she put the head of her hammer on the ground.

Tails held up three fingers. "We'll be taking the Tornado. There are three of us going, and three to be rescued. Sonic's already on his way, but because the place seems to be underwater he'll probably need our help getting out. I've figured out a way to make seven fit on the Tornado, but I highly doubt that we could squeeze in an eighth. It's just not safe."

Amy glared at him. "I only see two of you."

"Do I not count in your beautiful eyes?" Alwen huffed and crossed his arms, but still barely betraying his misted face.

Her eyes opened wide and her pupils shrank. "You're letting HIM go and not ME?!"

"As I said before, Eggman's new hide out is in the middle of a coral reef. Alwen can swim," Tails explained.

"My home is an underwater research facility. I was swimming with air tanks before I could walk and using hand signs before I could talk. Where did _you_ grow up?" Alwen came closer, there was a loving mock in his eyes and voice. "The beach?"

Amy crossed her arms. "Wouldn't you like to know!" The hammer had disappeared.

"She was a gypsy, she grew up on the road."

"TAILS!"

He turned around. "How's it going Knuckles?"

"Almost ready." Knuckles had installed a float to the bottom of one of the landing gear struts and was half done with the other one.

Amy fumed. "Fine! If you must know, I traveled the world with my family until my cards told me where I could… _would_ meet Sonic."

"You were a fortune teller?" Alwen asked. "How interesting."

Amy blinked. "How did we get off topic? Tails! I'm coming with you guys!"

Tails poked his head out of a small shed. "I only have _so_ many air tanks!"

"Then we'll think of something else!" Amy walked toward the plane.

"The other float is installed! Now we can land in water!" Knuckles called from the other side of the Tornado.

Something beeped. "Just in time too," Tails poked his cam com and the beeping stopped. "Ok everyone, let's go!" He grabbed Amy's dress as she started to climb in. "There's no room."

"Sonic can run on water! Let go of me!" Amy pushed his hand away with her foot and stood on top of the upper wing.

"Have you ever done this before?" Knuckles stood on the other side of the same wing. "Standing on top of the wing while in flight?"

"As a matter of fact, I have." Amy knelt and held onto the front edge of the wing.

Alwen gagged and busted out laughing to himself as he climbed into the back seat.

"If you say so." Knuckles continued to stare forward.

Tails started the engine. "This is _not_ a good idea."

"Amy, if you're going to be up there, at least put this on!" Alwen tossed her a parachute. "Do you know how to use it?"

Amy stared at him as she blindly and perfectly fastened all the buckles and adjusted the straps.

"Sorry I asked."

"Up, up, and off we go!" Tails tilted the joystick forward and away they went.

* * *

With nothing else to do, Sonic leaned against the rounded bowel of the capsule bot. "You must be a new model. I've never seen anything quite like you before."

The bot said nothing.

"If _that's_ the case," Sonic kicked the side. "I didn't want to talk to you either!"

The bot rocked violently, rolling him into the forgotten metal chair.

"Did we stop? So soon?" Sonic rubbed his head, kicking the chair aside. "Good."

A sensation like being in a descending elevator came trembling over the entire craft. Sonic stood up. There were no windows, so no clues on the whereabouts or surrounding terrain. Sonic paced around the toppled chair a few times. Suddenly, he felt something through the floor. It was like the bottom of the egg shaped pod had landed on something not quite solid, but enough to be there, and was struggling not to tip over in it. Quickly Sonic realized that the not quite something had to the ocean, and the struggling must be the motor on top doing all it could to keep on top. But if the top heavy engine failed, and the pod would go rushing back up to the surface upside down…

Sonic shook the thought from his head. _The motor is probably on the bottom anyway!_ Sonic felt something outside clamp onto the pod, and after a minute, watched a hole in the floor slide open. Sonic jumped down into a clear glass cylinder "You have _got_ to be kidding me, Egghead!"

As he gazed around, Sonic just couldn't believe what he was seeing. The new hideout was actually beautiful! Gorgeous! The floors shone of polished alabaster slabs, and the walls boasted enormous picture windows and curved view-ports Colorful fish of every shape, size, and color nibbled at feeding blocks at the corners of the glass. Of the walls, those that weren't plugged with glass showed off magnificent beach and ocean paintings or ornate marble mermaid statues. The ceiling was made of entirely curved glass, over which you could see clear blue water, fish hemmed in with thick bubble fences, and above it all the sun. When Sonic turned around and saw again the eyesore that had transported him here, it seemed greatly out of place.

A hologram of a human lady appeared out of the floor. "This way, please. The Doctor has been expecting you."

"I'll bet!" Sonic kept looking around as he followed the blinking dots along the baseboards. The more wonders that he met, the more he convinced himself that this place wasn't really _Eggman's_ new headquarters. But if he had built it all, why all the statues and paintings? Why a hologram instead of a robot? Did the cheery glass windows of fish really replace all the laser and missile trapped doors this time? He shook his head. _It just doesn't make any sense. Unless someone else built this place… and then Eggman stole it… but why? Surely not for the fish!_

As they went, the windows showed less sand and more reef. Hence even more colorful fish.

_Maybe Eggman wanted this one to last._ Sonic snickered._ He made it all nice looking so I wouldn't break it all on my way out._

"Just inside this door." The hologram stopped at a set of large wooden doors with brass handles.

"You can't open the door?" Sonic asked, pulling up the backpack strap.

"I am a hologram," she answered. "The Doctor is waiting for you."

Sonic grabbed one brass handle with one hand and heaved the solid maple wall open like a gaping mouth. Quickly he skipped around the closing edge.

"Ah! Sonic! Welcome to my new Fun House!"

Sonic looked up.

Eggman had barely glanced up to welcome his arch enemy, he seemed much too busy rubbing the smoothness of a polished solid wood desk. Then he leaned backward and put his boots up on the black oak work surface. Eggman grinned.

"So, Eggman." Sonic casually stepped forward. "Where is everyone?"

"He, he. Wouldn't you like to know." Eggman brought a small box with two switches and an antenna onto the the table. "But business first, shall we? Where is the Red Ring?"

"The Red Ring isn't red. It's purple."

"Whatever! Do you have it?"

Sonic smirked. "Would I be here if I didn't?"

"We shall see." Eggman flipped the lower switch on the little box.

Sonic looked around, wondering if anything special was supposed to happen.

"AH HA! You deceitful little rodent!" Eggman stood up and pointed at him. Several missile launchers popped up from the floor and sank out of the roof.

"Oh ho! What just happened?" Sonic took a step back. He held up a hand to all the missile heads aimed at him. Just then he noticed the bracelet, it had stopped glowing blue and was now a lifeless gray ring. "Oh great."

"Great for me, but not for you!"

"No really, great!" Sonic dropped the bag and spun around the room, destroying all the launchers in one sweep.

"NO!" Eggman flipped the second switch back to where it had been before.

Instantly, Sonic fell out of the spin and landed on a padded couch, laughing. "Now I know which remote controls these little baddies!" The bracelets had started to shimmer again.

"That will be the_ last_ time you _ever_ destroy something of mine!" Eggman dropped the remote on the floor. "And I assure you, I only made one."

"Wait, what are you doing?" Sonic jumped to his feet and moved as fast as the bracelets allowed to the other side of the desk just as Eggman put his foot down.

The remote was crushed into dust.

_One, the only remote…_ Sonic looked up. "I didn't want your help with these pains in the wrists anyway!"

Eggman laughed. "What's the matter, Hedgehog? Are you lost without your speedy feet?"

"Who said I need Chaos Energy to be fast?"

The gleeful smile under Eggman's mustache melted. "Uh, what do you mean?"

Eggman saw a small white fist fly at his face, so he took half a step back. But now there was a foot hooked around his ankle, and he was falling backwards.

Sonic jumped on the doctor's cushy mid-section and leaned in really close to his face. "Where are Frankie, Jack, and Patty?"


	11. Chapter 10 Duck Duck Wild Goose

Duck Duck Wild Goose

The Tornado circled the string of islands yet again.

"For the fortieth time, I don't see anything!" Alwen leaned slightly over the edge of the cockpit, eyes down.

"You're the one who said we'd find them here! Pht! Tails!" Amy's hair flew in her face with every altercation of the Tornado's direction.

"I don't understand it!" Tails looked sorrowfully at the pretty reefs shining from under the cyan ocean. "Those fish don't live anywhere else! We should have seen it by now!"

"Tails?" Alwen poked him in the shoulder. "Can I see your… your… your watch thing that has a video camera in it?"

"Cam com." Tails carefully unfastened it and passed it back.

"Thank you."

"What I don't understand is why Sonic hasn't called in yet!" Knuckles looked back but still pointed his nose forward. "I'd have thought he would have told us when he gave Eggman our excuse for the Red Ring!"

"Did anyone ever get that to him?" Tails thought back to the hour before, when they turned the power ring purple.

"Get what –pht! to who?" Amy asked.

"This thing to Sonic?" Alwen held up the purple ring, but he was still looking down into Tails's cam com.

"NOO!" Tails reached back and took it. "I mean yes! But 'No' that Sonic doesn't have it!"

"It fell out while you were looking for the tracking device, so I thought I'd grab it," Alwen continued to study the tiny screen.

"Something tells me our whole plan just fell through the roof," Knuckles smacked his forehead.

"What does this mean?" Amy asked. "I thought you said you put it in his pack, Tails!"

Tails opened his mouth to answer, but then Alwen suddenly shouted, excitedly bouncing in his seat, "I KNOW WHERE THEY ARE! I KNOW WHERE THEY ARE! I've been there!"

"Where? What are you looking at?" Tails reached back for his cam com.

"Here!" Alwen gave it back. "That picture Jack showed us, I know where they are!"

"STOP SHOUTING AND TELL US!" Amy yelled over the wind noise.

"ARF is only one sub-sea station," Alwen began his explanation. "There are several research stations around the globe listening to and recording all the fish noises they hear! But everything is coordinated by one large station in the Carrabin Sea! I went there once, and everything was so pretty, I thought of it as the most beautiful place under the sun! There weren't any robots or Eggmans there, though. But the most exquisitely carved mermaids lined the walls where there weren't windows! I saw one in that picture! And about your rare fish Tails? Papa told me once that they went all out on their marine research! Years ago, they imported huge live samples of every coral reef in the world! So it's no surprise they had Howihi fish there!"

"And, pray tell, _where_ is this marine wonder land of yours?" Tails asked.

"In the Carrabin Sea!"

"A long ways off, in other words," he mumbled to himself. Tails slowly tilted the joy stick. "Hang on, Amy and Knuckles! Back across the continent we go!"

* * *

"Unlike _you,_ rodent, _I_ came prepared." Eggman pushed a button hidden under the desk.

A closet on the other wall burst open, out of which exploded something shiny that clamped its cold needle fingers under Sonic's chin. When Sonic opened his eyes, he was face to metallic face with himself. "Really Egghead? You brought a_ Metal Sonic_ with you?"

"Did I not warn you that this was my new Fun House?" Eggman stood up and brushed off his coat. "And I plan on having lots of fun. Metal Sonic! Take him outside and put him where I told you. I must prepare for the others."

"Others?" Sonic choked out, pushing against Metal Sonic's eyes.

"Of course!" Eggman spread his arms as Metal Sonic lifted its arm, carrying Sonic out of the room. "Your friends certainly wouldn't want you to be without the Red Ring. I suspect they will try to return it to you. But don't worry! I'll be ready for them!" Eggman picked up the deserted back pack and shook it upside down. Only the tracking chip fell out. "So, Tails is a bit more clever than I gave him credit for. No matter."

The door swooped softly shut behind them.

Sonic stared into Metal Sonic's eyes, refusing to feel helpless. He kicked at its knees, causing it to fall forward on top of him. Sonic quickly grabbed Metal Sonic's head and slammed it into the nearest mermaid. The marble statue knocked back against the glass, scaring away all the fish. Then it slowly rocked forward, millimeter by millimeter. Sonic fought the robot's movement to keep it in the shadow of the tipping mermaid until…

_CRABOOMSH!_

"No way Eggman didn't hear that one." Sonic pried the now dead needle fingers away from his neck and bolted just as the first robots appeared.

Once upon a time, a much younger Sonic picked up a strange green gem and found he could run ten times as fast as before. Now, stuck with little more foot speed than the average track and field runner, Sonic found himself in need of some serious improvisation.

Around a sharp corner, Sonic jumped and slammed his feet into one of the mermaid statues, sending it sliding down the hall. The robots zoomed it and ignored the only non-mermaid statue in that row. When all ten had zoomed past, Sonic ran the other direction, back around a different corner, opened a closet and dove inside.

Sonic sighed. "Too bad Egghead didn't program most of his robots with brains."

_Knock knock knock!_ The ridged stiffness of the sound gave away what the knocker was made of.

"Looks like the siren's charms don't work on in-organics." Sonic jumped and caught a wooden shelf above his head.

The door splintered open and the sound of several guns locking aim could be heard.

Swung himself on top of the shelf and squeezed behind a heavy box of computer equipment.

All ten of the robots hurried to fit in the closet at once, but only five had succeeded by the time Sonic pushed the box off the shelf and leaped away over the remaining metal heads. Sonic skid around the corner before they had time to react, and tried to find his way to the glass column where he had come in from.

Most of this under water colony, or vacation spot, or whatever it was, seemed to be just long straight halls of glass laid out in a grid. The end of every hall had some kind of double doors like Eggman's office, and every intersection held something interesting. The first intersection Sonic found held a large tank of jellyfish. The next like a golden dolphin statue. The one after had the tube he was looking for, only this one was filled with water and had a person inside. Sonic skid to a halt and took a closer look.

The person in the tube waved, but he was in some kind of suit and there was a mask on his face that covered all but his eyes. The eyes were kinda familiar…

The clatter of confused robots caught up with Sonic and he continued running down the hall.

* * *

Alwen felt a little insulted when Sonic ran away, but quickly understood why when he saw four scary robots rocket after him. But then one last robot stopped to look at the uninvited guest. _Oh no!_ Alwen panicked and kicked to swim back up.

The robot decided to fire at the tube. One lucky shot hit the button used to drain the tank so the occupant could be warmly welcomed inside, in this case, to a battle.

The doors in the roof slid shut before Alwen was able to stop them with his hand, and bubbles came up from a drain in the floor. He looked down at the robot. If it kept shooting at him, Alwen wouldn't _need_ to wait for the water to drain.

One crack in the curved glass after another, and suddenly the whole side of the column facing the robot shattered and the ocean inside gushed out. Alwen covered his head and curled into a ball, rolling with the flow. He was dumped on top of the robot but jumped away as fast as he could. He started running, looked over his shoulder and stopped. He took the breathing regulator out of his mouth and stared closer, then started to laugh. The robot had been shorted out.

"SONIC! I'M HERE TO HELP YOU!" Alwen shouted.

"BIG MISTAKE!" echoed back his reply.

A single robot shot into view and turned its head toward Alwen.

Alwen gulped. "AAAHHH!" He started moving as fast as he could down the closest hallway. At the end of the hall was a door. He pulled on the brass handles and pounded the maple wood. "Somebody let me in! Hurry!" He looked over a shoulder.

The robot almost appeared confused. Usually, the hedgehog would attack it, not pound on a locked door for help. But no matter, it raised its laser gun.

Alwen ducked the first shot. When he looked at his enemy again, there no longer stood a robot, but a great white shark. He pulled out his dive knife and leaped forward. The knife just happened to cut a couple critical wires, and the robot collapsed as Alwen jerked his knife out again. It sputtered and sparked before collapsing on the floor.

Alwen stood there, stunned. "Wow."

Sonic ran passed, still three robots flying after him. "Great job! Now RUN!"

"I want to do that again! HEY! COME HERE YOU STUPID ROBOTS!" Alwen called as loud as he could.

The door behind him opened and poured forth with what looked like shark jaws rolling with hamster wheels.

"AH! No! I didn't mean it!" Alwen ran away from them, turn the corner and forget to watch where he was going until he hit his knees on something and fell into the golden dolphin fountain.

The little Chompers encircled the fountain, waiting.

Alwen sat up in the fountain and looked at them. "Ha ha! Can't get me now!" Then he got a better idea. "Here, take that!" He scooped up a handful of water and splashed it on one of the fierce little bots.

Except for the one, which had just died, all the little Chompers backed up and sped the same direction. Alwen looked and saw Tails just coming out of an unbroken access tube. The tube rose to let him out, and immediately Tails started to fly. "What _are_ these things?!"

"How should I know?" Alwen stood up in the fountain.

"Whatever. Don't worry about them." Tails pulled a giant magnet from hammer space and stuck all the little bots to it. "Now all we need is someone who can smash these babies! Like Knuckles!"

The tube came down again and filled with ocean water. Knuckles jumped in a moment later and pushed the inside exit switch. The water started to drain again.

"Incoming!" As Sonic ran by this time, he slipped on the water from the fountain "Whoa!" and continued sliding until where Tails was. Then Tails caught him before he fell. "Someone warn me next time!"

"Sorry!" Alwen called, still sitting in the fountain. "Wet floor!"

As the robots zoomed closer, Knuckles's glass rose and he pushed forward one big fist. The force of the blow pulverized two of the remaining robots, but the last one turned and sped away. "You ok, Big Blue?"

"Not until we find another way to deactivate these silly bracelets and find the hostages! Eggman crushed the remote under his boot." Sonic stood up and gingerly touched a spot on the back of his head.

"Oh. That'll be easy!" Tails tossed the magnet to Knuckles. "All I have to do is find the right frequency."

"Good!" Sonic saw Alwen sitting in the fountain. "You going to stand there all day or come over and join us?"

"Oh, right." Alwen stepped out of the fountain and waddled over in the flippers, lifting his tows with every step.

Knuckles smashed the wad of Chompers. "So, what was that excitement about when that tube over there suddenly cracked open?"

"I ended up taking out two of those things. Two!" Alwen held up two fingers. "And I couldn't have done it without my lucky diving knife!" He unsheathed the knife and kissed the flat side.

Tails snickered a bit. "Yeah, really lucky you didn't get ELECTROCUTED!"

Everyone laughed. The tube behind them refilled with water again and Amy descended into it like an angel. When it had emptied again, she spat out the breathing regulator and whipped out her hammer. "Where's Eggman? I've got a message for him!"

"He's hiding in one of the offices on the farthest wall that a way." Sonic indicated a direction.

"Don't bother asking which door it is." Alwen shook his head slightly. "I've been here before, and all the doors are the same."

"Close enough." Amy set off.

"Alwen," Tails pointed to him, while replacing the magnet in hammer space. "You said you knew this place, do you know where we should start looking for Jack, Frankie, and Patty?"

"Not off hand, really. I only came here once, and that was an year ago. Sorry." Alwen shook his head. "But I think the scientist would know where they could be, if we found them."

"Scientists?" Knuckles looked around.

Sonic shrugged. "I've only seen you guys and Eggman here, not counting the robots."

"That's my point!" Alwen looked excited. "This is a state of the art research facility. Most these rooms lead to underground labs where they do marine based experiments. Only a very few are here on the surface, so to speak. Even these halls," he waved around them, "were designed to make visitors feel like you were in a giant aquarium. They have reefs here from all over the world, and the scientists can study them up close from these large windows. Dad said about thirty people live here."

Tails looked up. "What did you say?"

"That thirty people live here but aren't here right now?"

"No," Tails stood up and flipped open his cam com. "The reefs. How many sections from one reef would they have? Or are different parts of the world in different places on the outside of this complex?"

"I'd think that they'd only need one of each. Why? What are you getting at?" Alwen looked over Tails's shoulder.

He showed him the picture again. "So all we have to do is look for that reef!"

"Great idea!" Sonic clapped his hands together. "Spread out everyone!"

They each took a tunnel and walked along it, looking for the certain reef. When they got to the end wall, they all looked at each other. "Time to go the other way now?" Knuckles asked.

"Wait! What's this?" Alwen pointed to a fish on the other side of the glass.

"Looks like one of the same fish. They've got to be around here!" Sonic turned slowly in a circle, scanning the walls.

Knuckles studied the picture from his own cam com. "If you look at the picture, the camera was pointed up. I think we should be looking down."

"Down?" Tails glanced at his wrist again. "I guess you're right."

So they felt all the low walls.

_Tap tap._

"Did anyone else hear that?" Tails asked.

"Hear what?" Knuckles listened.

"A tapping." Tails looked down.

Sonic jumped and landed hard, twice.

_Tap tap,_ came the response.

"Well, doesn't this look suspicious." Alwen was studying a section of maple wall in the corner. "If you look closely, these strips line up in almost a perfect square." He pointed out the section.

"How do we open it?" Knuckles asked.

Tails took out his magnet again and put it against the wall. It stuck. "There must be metal behind here." He walked slowly away, pulling the in-obvious door open.

Sonic poked his head inside. "HELLO! ANYONE HOME?!" His voice echoed for quite some time. "It's pitch black in there, and probably a maze. Anyone got a flash light?"

"I don't have hammerspace anyways." Alwen shrugged.

Knuckles pulled one odd thing out after another. "Nope. Nope. Nope. Sorry."

Tails repeated after Knuckles, but his collection was much more interesting. Several half-finished small projects and a number of tools and devices soon littered the floor, among which Sonic recognized a few of his things. "I don't seem to have a flash light either," Tails finished, practically wading in unknown gadgets.

"Tails, what is that thing?" Sonic poked one of the unfinished projects.

"I forgot. Say! Isn't that your glow stick?" Tails picked up a short, pale blue, plastic stick.

Knuckles chuckles. "The same one that didn't get broken the day_ Amy_ beat you in a race?"

"Oh, hush!" Sonic took the glow stick, broke it, and shook it awake. "I'm just glad it still works!

Tails laughed. "And then, and then it didn't matter because I had gotten there before either of you!"

Sonic looked at Alwen, who was grinning. "What are you smiling about?"

"Oh," Alwen folded his hands in back. "Don't mind me."

"Whatever. Just get going." Knuckles almost pushed Sonic in the hole.

Tails started to pick up the pile at his feet. "I suppose it was a good idea that I decided to pick up _the rest of_ that mess we left on Angel Island, huh?"

"Yeah, good idea." Knuckles put his head near the door. "Need any help, Sonic?"

"EEEEAAAAHHHH!" Amy burst out of a door, far down the hall.

"Something tells me she needs more help than I do, but thanks!" Sonic crawled on.


	12. Chapter 11 Aqua Boss

Aqua Boss

Amy shut the door as fast as she could and barred the handles with her hammer.

Tails and Knuckles ran up to her. "What happened?" Tails asked.

The doors thumped against the handle of Amy's hammer, as though something large and terrible on the other side wanted out. "I don't know! I ran down the stairs, then at the bottom I saw Eggman in his Eggmobile get into it!"

The doors jumped against the hammer again, almost shaking it out of place. Knuckles grabbed the hammer and held it under the brass handles. "What was it?"

The maple doors slammed against the hammer once again, this time causing it to splinter as it flew everywhere. Knuckles was knocked into Tails and Amy as the doors burst open and revealed Eggman's latest and greatest battle bot. "PREPARE TO MEET YOUR DOOM!"

"It was that," Amy squeaked and pointed one little finger.

If only by a spatial orientation miracle, Eggman had by some unknown law of engineering managed to build such a gigantic robot as needing a pilot but still have it fit under the curved aquarium roof. Conveniently, it was in the likeness of a great white shark with a rocket launcher for one arm (I mean fin) and a lobster claw hanging off the other side. Not to mention that this shark, like all others, possessed a killer mouthful of sharp razor teeth.

In the slip second before he attacked, Eggman stopped. The lobster pointed to each of them in turn as though counting. "Where did Sonic go?" he sounded genuinely surprised.

* * *

_BANG! BANG!_ Patty pounded her fist on the square ceiling tile.

"Bang bang to you too," a muffled voice ruffled through.

"Patty, stop!" Frankie shouted.

Jack jumped and flew to grab her off the ceiling.

"Hey!" Patty let go and they both dropped roughly on the floor. She glared at him.

The tile suddenly dented. Jack and Frankie's heads snapped up, so Patty watched too as the tile fell down under Sonic and landed with a _CRASH!_

"Sonic!" Jack jumped up. "Ain't we never gladder to see you!"

"I'm glad to see that all three of you are alright!" Sonic wiggled a blue glow stick.

Frankie clapped her hands and danced in a circle. "We's be rid from this stinking box! Yea! Yea! Hooray!"

She looked up. "You are a sight for sore eyes. I've have no one but_ these two_ for company for two days, and they've driven me to the edge of my sanity!" She raised her fists and grabbed her sleek black hair.

"Time's a wasting! Everyone out!" Sonic waved his arm. He waited until they'd all entered the tube, then jumped up to join them... and falling back after having risen only eighteen inches. "Oops..."

"What happened to ya?" Jack slipped back down the tube. "You ain't got nuthin to worry 'bout. I gocha." He gave him a hug and jumped, rapidly flapping his small wings.

From above, Patty shook her head. In an instant, her tong flung out and wrapped around them and brought them up to the tunnel. Sonic led them back outside, unlocking the door while holding the glow stick in his mouth. He carefully helped them out one by one, listening to the sounds of robotic battle several tunnels away.

"Shhh…" Sonic peered around the corner once they were all out. Eggman was riding in a big, white lobster looking thing, while the others (except for Alwen who was out of sight) applied the basic hit-and-dodge strategy, making it extremely difficult for Eggman to get and keep his tail covered. Sonic glanced back at the recently rescued. "There are at least twenty, maybe thirty local scientists also being held prison somewhere. If we find them, they could shut off the power of whatever that thing is running on."

"Excellent plan."

Sonic jumped. "Alwen?"

"The one and only." Alwen held out his hands. "I'll have a better idea where they could be than you, Sonic. So why don't you go give Eggman a piece of me while we find the button and toss Eggman's little scream into the tank, ok?" He unbuttoned the sheath for his diving knife and held it forward.

"Deal!" Sonic took the knife out and looked at it. "Nice," he tilted it back and forth, watching the blade shimmer.

"Come. I have an idea." Alwen beckoned to the rest of them.

Sonic peeked around the corner again. Seeing that Eggman's tail was turned, he sprinted for what looked like a weak spot. Sonic jumped and drove the sharp end of the knife through the gills of the shark.

Eggman's right fin rocket launcher started spinning out of control. "WHY YOU IMPRUDENT BACK STABBING FUR BALL!"

Sonic pulled the knife out, glad that it had a plastic handle. "It may not be as long as a real sword, but it still gets through. I'll bet that's cutting it a bit close, though."

"Yeah! Go Sonic!" Tails flew up and threw one of his forgotten, unfinished projects into the shield covering Eggman's pod.

"My hero!" Amy smacked the spinning rocket launcher another thwack for good measure.

"Would you all stop it?! One at a time!"

"What's the matter, Egghead?" Sonic taunted. "Can't keep your flank covered?"

"I was doing just fine until _you_ showed up!" Suddenly the entire robot rose another three feet off the floor. "GAH! What just happened?"

Knuckles stood under the tail of the shark, lifting it so the hovering devices no longer felt ground. "Consider yourself flanked!"

"Ah ha!" Sonic pointed at him. "Good one Knucks!"

"You fools!" Eggman stared at his control panels. "This is Aqua Boss! There is more to him than what meets the eye! Behold, the Freeze Ray!" The lobster claw shrank back a little bit from a pair of tubes, one of which had a lens over it.

"Uh, Eggman?" Tails was still flying, another unknown project in his hand. "It's a squirt gun and a laser."

"Ah yes! The perfect combination to put you all on ice!" Eggman sprayed Tails until he was soaking wet.

Tails flew out of the way. "Hey! I just got dry from the _last_ time I went swimming!"

"Stop it!" Amy held up two hammers to try and block the water.

"Dude! The lady said to stop!" Knuckles held the tail up with one and and punched it with the other until the entire machine broke in half.

Sonic slid out of the way of Eggman's faltering water jet. "Come on Egghead! Not even you usually resort the last—Hey!" He tried to leap out of the way, but the squirt gun followed him. Sonic finally held his breath and ducked against the wall until Eggman was satisfied. He flicked his hands. "I hate being wet."

"Down here, Eggman!" Knuckles clapped his hands. "Is the water for in hopes that it will make us slip or something?"

"I'll be happy to oblige so that you don't feel left out." Eggman finished by giving Knuckles the same soaking as everyone else.

"See? I knew he'd go for it." Knuckles patted Sonic on the back. "Now we're both all wet."

"Sure." Sonic stood up, smirking. "Or Eggman's just being a wet blanket!"

"Fine then, Rodent! You'll have the honor of going first!" Eggman aimed at Sonic again and fired the laser.

Only, it wasn't a laser. And the water wasn't really water. They never figured out exactly what they were, but whatever it was, it hit both Sonic and Knuckles. The water like solution froze instantly, effectively turning them both into living statues.

Amy's jaw dropped. "You… You…"

Eggman shown the light on her next, then she went silent. He looked at Tails.

Tails landed on the ground, worried that if Eggman decided to freeze him while still aloft, he'd crash into a thousand slivers of ice. "What did you do to them?!"

"Nothing, really." Eggman inspected the glaring statues. "Just gave them a heavy dose of killer frost bite. Not a lasting effect, though. Regrettably, they'll be fine in an hour, but only if you give me the Red Ring. Otherwise…" He stared at him though one eye, lifting that eyebrow with an evil grin on his face.

Tails took out the purple ring and threw it at the claw, which caught it. "There! Have your stupid Red Ring! You happy?"

The claw brought it closer so Eggman could study it with his own eyes. He began to laugh.

"Unfreeze them!" Tails walked up to Sonic and started puffing on his hand.

Sonic's eyes looked at him. He wiggled his fingers ever so slightly.

"Ho! Ho! Ho! Tails!" Eggman held up the purple ring. "You try _so_ hard sometimes, it's admirable! But you made two critical mistakes."

Tails looked up. "Oh, no."

"First," Eggman held up one finger. "I couldn't help but notice that you pulled it out of Hammerspace. If this were _really_ the Red Ring, it would have killed you to even touch it. I don't know how you stained it purple, but next time you decide to trick me, use an object that emits a _negative_ Chaos charge and not a positive one."

Tails turned around, upset and shaking his fists. "Well, what did you expect? There is no such thing as a Red Ring in real life! It came from an old cartoon!"

"And that cartoon was based on real people and real events!" Eggman opened the claw to drop the ring. "Just don't waste my time on this one, fox boy! Where did the last one of you go? The puny little kid who's been hanging out with you and acting so tough?"

Tails crossed his arms in defiance. "And just why would I tell you that even if I knew?"

"Never mind." Eggman froze him. "Now, where could that brat have scampered off to?" He made what was left of the shark move forward on the spare hovering devices. "COME OUT! COME OUT! WHEREVER YOU ARE!" his voice echoed across all the hallow hallways. "IF YOU VALUE THE LIVES OF SONIC AND HIS ADORABLE FRIENDS, YOU'LL GIVE YOURSELF UP WILLINGLY!"

The Aqua Boss passed the squished Metal Sonic, the crumbling statue filled with bullets, and at the corner he turned and Eggman saw that his little jail cell had been opened. "Cursed Hedgehog." He moved on.

"_PFPFPTTT!"_

"What was that?" Eggman slowly turned the Aqua Boss around, looking for the source of the noises that continued to disrupt the peace.

Finally the noises became a _TAPFT_ for about one second before they said in a loud voice that seemed to emanate from the walls themselves, "Is it working?"

A background voice replied, "Yes, it should be working now."

"Ok." The first speaker cleared his throat. "HELLO EGGMAN!"

"Who are you?!" Eggman asked in aloud. "What is going on here!?"

"I HEARD THAT YOU WERE ASKING ABOUT ME! SO ALLOW ME TO INTRODUCE MYSELF. I AM THE WIMPY LITTLE KID WHO'S BEEN HANGING AROUND SONIC LATELY!"

Eggman made the shark hover forward again. "You are using the PA system! Aren't you?"

* * *

Alwen gasped and clapped the side of his open mouth. "Oh no! I guess you've found out my little secret!" The chair squeaked as he leaned back and looked over his shoulder. He didn't bother to cover the microphone. "I guess we'll have to call the whole thing off, guys! He's on his way!"

Patty smiled at him, but continued rapidly signing with the local scientists.

"What are you planning to do down there?" Eggman asked over the hidden intercom.

"Oh, don't worry about it." Alwen held the microphone closer to his mouth again and kicked his feet up on the desk. "Hey! Have you seen Amy Rose?"

You could almost see Eggman's ears steam on the camera screens. "What about her?!"

"Tell her I'd send give her a ring for luck!" Alwen audibly kissed his fingers and then touched Amy's picture in another screen. He could see that Sonic and his friends were beginning to be able to melt and shiver. Alwen pointed to Frankie.

She silently turned the thermostat up a few more degrees.

Eggman chuckled a bit. "Amy can't use either at the moment. I happen to know that she's giving you the cold shoulder." He turned a corner and approached the door to the stairs above the PA room.

"Yeah, yeah, yeah. I know she's got her heart set on Sonic." Alwen used one computer screen to check the weather. "Say, Robotnik!"

"I am called Dr. Eggman now!" He walked right up to the door.

"Whatever!" Alwen clicked the mouse a few times. "Can you give me an update on the weather?"

Eggman used the lobster claw to punch the door down.

Alwen quickly pointed to Jack.

Jack nodded and threw the switch.

Bolts of electricity struck the Aqua Boss, causing it to malfunction and arc with electricity.

"AMY! RING! NOW!" Alwen shouted into the microphone.

On the screens with Amy and Team Sonic on them, Amy summoned her hammer and dropped it on her feet it to crack the ice. She pointed her toes, tipping herself over within reach of the ring. The purple ring dinged up into her, and all the ice on her melted. She freed Sonic, Tails, and Knuckles, then ran up to Eggman threw the hammer into the side of the Aqua Boss. It toppled to the side, with Eggman throwing a fit in the cockpit.

"Let's go!" Alwen jumped out of the chair and joined the others running up the stairs. He got to the head of the gang and opened the inner doors. Eggman's window was right in front of him. He smiled and clucked his tong. "Ninety eight percent chance electrical storms."

"Why you…" Eggman grumbled.

Amy appeared above the whole thing and slammed her hammer down to shatter the bulb window. She pointed her finger at his nose "Sixty second head start!"

Eggman crawled out of the wreck and ran away.

Amy curtsied to the scientists. "Please accept this… the remains of this robot as a gift from all of us. You could study it and learn what that freeze ray was."

"I have a better idea." Sonic made a fist and smashed the lens.

"Sonic!" Amy stood up and put her fists on her hips.

The head scientist, Dr. Fin, an elephant seal, smiled and shook his head, causing his dangling nose to wiggle. "Thank you for the generous offer, but we are marine biologists. We know nothing about robotics."

"Ok." Knuckles walked up and looked at Sonic. "Now what are _we_ going to do with it?"

"I don't know." Sonic shook his head. "Personally, I don't care! Just as long as it never wakes up again. Which pretty much sums up my opinion of all of Eggman's robots."

"So are we just going to leave it here?" Tails shivered and picked off a piece of melting ice still sticking to his arm.

"We have a way to get rid of it," Dr. Fin suggested. "But first we have to get it there."

Everyone picked a spot and helped tip it back upright. The broken lifters helped some, but everyone still needed to hold on. Except for Knuckles, who went back to get the tail, they all helped move the robot into a large submarine. Dr. Fin thanked everyone for getting rid of Eggman and assured them all that they could manage cleaning up the remaining debris and replacing the broken statues. Knuckles climbed on board and away they went.

* * *

A couple minutes before the sub broke the surface near a sea port, a light turned on next to the rocket launcher. But it was a small light, so nobody noticed.

"Ain't I glad there's a window between me and them!" Frankie pointed to all the fish they were passing by.

Jack put his hand on the thick glass. "I think I'd rather there not be a window."

"Why?" Frankie's enormous ears folded back.

He grinned at her. "So there'd be nothing between me and them, and then I couldn't not have to watch, and then I'd be swimming with them!"

"Have you ever swam with a dolphin?" Alwen glanced that way briefly, still continuing to sign with Patty.

Jack's grin widened.

Frankie walked away from the window and sat beside Sonic on a large chest. "I figure my brother ain't nothing but hapless hopeless. How 'bout you?"

"I wouldn't know." Sonic (who suddenly found himself being forced to regain his composure) glanced over to Jack, who was puffing of the glass and drawing with a finger. Then he smiled at Tails. "My Little Bro is a genius!"

Tails put up a thumbs up in their direction, who stood looking out the front window with Knuckles and Amy.

Knuckles looked at Patty and Alwen and rubbed his chin. "What are they doing?"

"It's called sign language." Tails glanced at Knuckles. "Talking with hand gestures."

"That'd be cool if we could all do that," Amy mused, turning around. "It really would've helped Cream and I to better get the jump on you and Sonic on Angel Island."

"No, I don't think so." Tails looked out the window. "We heard you because Cream giggled."

"What I don't understand," Knuckles pointed to the silent conversation, "is _how_ they are going so fast!"

It was true. Patty was moving her hands and fingers so fast, she was practically speed talking. 'Do you read much?' she asked.

Alwen shook his head and made signs for, 'No. When I am not swimming, I play video games mostly. When I can't get past one part, I sometimes turn on TV shows.'

'If I'm watching movies, I make my dad turn volume off. That makes subtitles show up.' Patty giggled a bit. 'Once he was watching live action when I came in room, but he wouldn't turn sound off. Then I told him that I could see what they were speaking anyway because of way their lips moved.'

Alwen laughed. 'Tough love.'

All three standing at the large window were staring at the speeding fingers by now. Tails whispered, "Do you think they are talking about us?"

"Just as long as he's giggling about her and not me." Amy faced the window again.

Knuckles pulled Tails aside. "About the hide and seek gag, I never told you what your prize was."

"Oh yeah?" Tails could tell it was going to be something mischievous.

Knuckles nodded, quickly glancing at Sonic. "You get to tell me what to do for an hour, but only if you accept this dare."

Tails grinned. "I'm listening."

"I dare you to tell Sonic that you're going to…"

Something exploded, a wall was ripped open and water gushed in by giant spurts.

"AAAHHH!" Frankie jumped to a taller crate.

Sonic stood up on top of the chest. "What happened?!"

"I seen it!" Jack shouted, pointing to the robot.

Tails snapped his fingers. "I'll bet that rocket launcher still had some juice in it. TIME TO EVACUATE! THIS SUB WILL START SINKING SOON!"

"Do we have any life-jackets?!" Sonic looked up and all around.

Alwen jumped at a crate and threw it open. "Here! Everybody grab one!" He started throwing life-jackets at people.

The water was up to everyone's knees as they each struggled to find one their size. Frankie struggled with this, as she was too small for an adult size. Jack struggled too, having to find one that would fit his wings. Alwen solved their problems by grabbing an extra-large, pulling them together, and stuffing them both into it. "Ok, now just hold onto it TIGHTLY!"

"Alwen! Your weight belt!" Patty pointed to it as she buckled the last buckle.

He unfastened the weights and they thudded on the floor. "Don't forget to pull these tight." He tugged on the straps of her life-jacket.

"You all set Amy?" Sonic asked.

"I'm more worried about you!" Amy fussed over his jacket.

"Where's yours, Alwen?" Tails took the life jacket handed him.

Alwen closed the trunk. "That was the last one. I won't need it as much as any of you will."

"Take mine!" Knuckles held it forward.

Alwen shook his head and pushed the floating trunk under top hatch. "You're forgetting that I grew up in the ocean! And I have an air tank, I'll be fine! Someone hold this still for me!"

Sonic and Tails grabbed either end while Knuckles hurriedly put his life-jacket back on.

Tails looked up. "Everyone start breathing deeply!"

Slowly, shakily, Alwen climbed onto the floating crate. He carefully turned the wheel of the circular door until it stopped. Then he pushed up on it and the pulsing flush in the wall steadied out as more water poured in from above.

Everyone's toes lifted off the floor, and soon they had to push against the ceiling until the ocean swallowed them. Then Alwen pushed the hatch completely open and swam up. One by one they followed. Alwen stayed with the sub as everyone came out. Sonic was the last one out, moving mostly by the rising life-jacket. So Alwen wrapped his arms around him and they passed everyone on their way to the surface. On top, he spat out the breathing regulator. "All that running every day, and you were floundering like a dying fish?! What's wrong with you?"

Sonic breathed deeply, coughing a bit before answering, "I can't swim."

"You can't swim?" Alwen raised his eyebrows.

That's when they both started to laugh.


	13. Epilogue: The Red Ring

The Red Ring

Tails clicked the call button. "I don't know how fast your internet connection is, Aunt Vickie, but I'm still going to hope this works."

They were all back on Aunt Vickie's farm, sitting on the lawn and on a log with a laptop sitting on a rock and facing them, and behind the shivering huddle stood the skeleton of the new barn.

"I sure trust you, Pumpkin," she passed out hot chocolate from her wooden platter. "After all, you helped bring all of my babies back home safe and sound. And not a one of them has got a scratch! And I know you good with tinkering."

"Yeah, you managed to unlock Eggman's little gifts." Sonic rubbed one wrist, then accepted the large mug. "Thanks."

Amy scooted next to him on the log. "You know, maybe Eggman was on to something this time. If you were just a _little_ slower, I'd be able to catch up with you more often."

"Perhaps you should just get a pair that makes you faster." Alwen grinned over his shoulder.

"And perhaps you could teach me how to swim better?" Patty discretely laced her fingers between his and touched his nose with her free hand. "Where I come from, most of the water is too cold to swim in most of the year."

Alwen blushed. "I could do that."

Jack clucked his tong at Frankie. "Ain't you got nothing else to look at but them?"

"There ain't nothing wrong with looking, ain't there be?" Frankie lifted her nose at her brother.

"We ain't old enough for the mushy stuff yet." Jack sipped his hot chocolate.

Tails clicked on the call button again. "Alwen, are you sure your parents are in the living quarters?"

"They have to be." Alwen blinked. "Oh look!"

Tails turned back to the screen. "Whoa! Hello."

Alwen's dad grinned from the screen. "Well, well, well. Who are all these people?"

"Hi Dad!" Alwen waved his free hand. "Where's Mom? I wanted to introduce you guys to all my new friends!"

"She's on her way, Sport. You can at least start."

"Ok." He stood up and pointed to one and all in turn. "These are Patty, Jack, Frankie, Knuckles, Sonic, Amy, Tails, and I know you've met Aunt Vickie."

"Your boy has had quite the adventure with all these." Aunt Vickie swept her arm over all the younger heads.

"And I'd better believe it with the kind of company he's keeping." He smiled. "How's everybody doing?"

"Totally awesome, Dude!" Sonic held forward a thumbs up. "Come on, everybody!"

Everyone waved and cheered, even Aunt Vickie.

Just then, Alwen's mom came in. "Dear, I think I've found something. Oh," She saw the live video. "Who are you talking to?"

"A lot of very famous people." He rolled his chair back a bit.

She smiled, lifting one hand to wave. "Oh. Hi."

"Say, Alwen's mom?" Knuckles asked. "What is that you're holding?"

"Oh, it's something we found that's really helped with decoding aqua marine mammal audio signals." She held the object up for view of the camera.

Sonic, Tails, Amy, Knuckles, and Alwen all gasped and jumped up waving their at the same time, for in her hands was a shiny red ring. "DON'T TELL EGGMAN!"

"Jinx you all!" Alwen pointed back.

Frankie winced and covered her large ears. "Ouch."

"What?" Patty pulled Alwen back down.

"I got the feeling that you and I ain't in on the scoop, Francine." Jack sighed.

Alwen's parents looked startled. His dad spoke first. "What's wrong? Who said anything about Dr. Eggman?"

"He was after something called the Red Ring." Tails explained. "When you tell the world how you broke the communication barrier, say nothing about that ring you found. Please, it'll save everyone a lot of trouble. A LOT of trouble."

"We can do that." Alwen's mom nodded on screen and set the ring down. "So, everyone. How was your first day of school?"

"School?" Jack shook his head. "There wasn't no school today. We got ourselves a barn raisin' party!"

"When the other students saw that we were in town," Amy motioned to everyone sitting on the log, "they swarmed the principal's office for a field trip! It was amazing!"

"It almost didn't happen," Tails laughed. "Until Sonic ran around the campus, rattling windows. And then Knuckles and I got down on our knees with all the others, begging for a barn raining party."

Patty held up her camera at the computer. "I got to take pictures!"

Alwen's mother laughed. "Be sure to text them home when you get the chance."

"Don't worry! I will!" Alwen waved.

"Well, we have to get going now." His dad leaned forward. "Getting kind of late, and we have a big day in the morning. Good night, Sport."

"Good night all," Alwen's mom put her hands on her husband's shoulders.

"On the count of three." Vickie raised a giant paw. "One, two, there!"

"GOOD NIGHT!" Everyone waved.

"If Cream were here," Amy sipped her hot chocolate. "We'd hear Cheese say 'Chao!'"

"Speaking of chao." Sonic tapped Jack on the shoulder. "What ever happened to the two you guys took home?"

He set his mug in the grass. "Oh, them? Well, that twin thing ain't never going to work no more. Mime grew wings."

"And Kitty got acrobatic." Frankie sipped from her mug. "They're at home, keeping company with Mama."

Tails opened his eyes large, as though suddenly remembering something. "OH NO!"

"What is it, little dude?" Sonic asked. "It can't be _that_ important."

"We forgot the Tornado in the middle of the sea!"

There was silence for almost two whole minutes. Finally Sonic sighed. "Like I said, not that important."

Tails turned to him and stared. "THE TORNADO IS NOT IMPORTANT?!"

"Not right now." Sonic pointed to the steaming chocolate beside him. "Enjoy your drink."


	14. Chapter 13 Author's Notes

**Author's notes**

I thought that last story would be **The End**. But as it turns out, a true writer can't do anything but write and keep on writing. And so, the adventure begins anew... Also I suppose Sonic might have been acting a little out of character while in bracelet captivity, but along with his HUMONGOUS character trait of being athletic, remember that Sonic has also been known to be quite lazy at times.

**Credits**

******I have to admit** that I originally borrowed the idea for a Red Ring from Fiz, find-able on the great and noble Sonic Retro web sight. THE RED RINGS is a hack of Sonic the Hedgehog 1 for the Genesis by Fiz. In this hack, all the rings and monitors are replaced by bouncing red rings. Touch one of them and you get killed. This is an idea I have continued to find interesting, but haven't been able to incorporate it much into many of my stories.

**Likewise:**

Tails, Knuckles, Amy, Cream, Vanilla, Cheese, the Tornado, the Chaos Emeralds, Mobius, and Sonic all belong to SEGA, an honorable organization to which I have no official affiliation other than being a costumer and a fan.

**On the other hand…**

Alwen, his parents, Patty, Jack, Frankie, their two "twin" chao, Aunt Vickie, Aunt V's farm, ARF, the Hurricane, the other sub-sea research station, Aqua Boss, Sonic's bracelets, Crazy Dye, Dune, Aerial, and the idea that the Falcon Wing is really a previous Tornado, are all MINE, and if ANYONE ever wants to use or borrow ANYTHING ELSE that I made up, all you gotta do is send me one of those PM envelopes in the upper left corner up there.

**Inspirations**

****I imagine, for the scene where Alwen had his little spat at Sonic and vica versa, the song "Welcome to My Life" by Simple Plan. Other than that, I guess any sort of love song involving him being confused, like Superchick's "Wonder [What His Name Is...]" except for a socially awkward guy with a terrible crush on the girl he's so much a fan of. (Now where have we heard _that_ before?)


End file.
